St. Scholastica Shuts Out St. Norbert, First Home NCHA Shutout of SNC Since 1995

From Sports Information Director, January 30, 2009 | Men's Hockey
by Dan Lukes, dan.lukes@snc.edu, (920) 403-4077

GREEN BAY - The College of St. Scholastica continued its surge toward the top of the Northern Collegiate Hockey Association standings with a convincing 3-0 win over St. Norbert College at the Cornerstone Community Center.

The Saints, ranked No. 2 in the USCHO.com Poll, improved to 17-3-2 overall and 8-2-1 in the NCHA, one point behind first-place UW-Superior. St. Scholastica handed St. Norbert its first home shutout in an NCHA game since a 3-0 loss to UW-River Falls on Feb. 10, 1995. It was the Green Knights' first shutout overall by an NCHA opponent since Nov. 5, 1999. St. Norbert had not been shutout at the Cornerstone Community Center since a 1-0 loss to Middlebury College on Dec. 2, 2000.

Fifth-ranked St. Norbert, now 15-6-1 overall and 6-4-1 in the NCHA, saw its scoring slump continue. The Green Knights, 7-6-1 in their last 14 games, have scored five total goals in their last four games.

St. Scholastica got all the scoring it would need on a first-period shorthanded goal by Matt Saler. Saler's first goal of the season came at the 13 minute mark of the first period.

The Saints would pad their lead at the 8:33 mark of the second period when Saler found Jeff Gagnon all alone in the slot for a one-on-the-goaltender goal and a 2-0 lead.

A.J. Tucker would round out St. Scholastica's scoring with a 5-on-3 power-play goal at 6:53. Tucker would take tic-tac-toe passes from Jeremy Dawes and Dustin DeGagner for his 15th goal of the year.

St. Norbert could not solve St. Scholastica goaltender Steve Bounds, who made 29 saves for the shutout. Any decent St. Norbert scoring chances were turned away time and again by Bounds, who made 10 saves in each of the first and third periods and nine in the second period.

Blake Bashor worked the first two periods in net for St. Norbert, making 10 saves. B.J. O'Brien made seven stops in the third period for the Green Knights.

St. Norbert outshot St. Scholastica 29-20. The Saints were 1-for-3 on the power play, while the Green Knights were 0-for-5.