St. Norbert Shuts Out St. Scholastica, Gets Share of NCHA Title

From Sports Information Director, February 2, 2008 | Men's Hockey
by Dan Lukes, dan.lukes@snc.edu, (920) 403-4077

DULUTH, Minn. - St. Norbert College extended its unbeaten streak to 19 with a 3-0 win over the College of St. Scholastica in a Northern Collegiate Hockey Association game at Mars Lakeview Arena.

With the win, along with UW-River Falls' loss and a tie by UW-Stout, puts the Green Knights in first place by six points with three games left in the NCHA race. St. Norbert needs just one point in its final three games to clinch the No. 1 seed for the NCHA Peters Cup Playoffs, and its regular-season championship is its 10th in the last 12 seasons.

St. Norbert, ranked No. 2 in the USCHO.com poll, is now 18-1-3 overall and 8-0-3 in the NCHA. St. Scholastica fell to 8-12-2, 3-7-1.

Green Knight goaltender Kyle Jones made 29 saves for St. Norbert to pitch his 20th career shutout, becoming just the second goaltender in any division in the history of NCAA men's ice hockey to reach the plateau. Michigan State's Ryan Miller, currently with the NHL's Buffalo Sabres, had 26 from 1999-2002. The 20th shutout came in Jones' 97th career start.

St. Norbert drew first blood in the contest when Mike Bernardy scored his second goal of the season on a 5-on-3 power play at 12:10 of the first period.

The Green Knights made it 2-0 at 7:48 of the second period when St. Scholastica goaltender Steve Bounds was playing a puck behind his net when St. Norbert's Steven Sleep stole the puck and flipped it to Marc Belanger, who knocked it in the wide-open net for his 17th goal of the year.

St. Norbert's final tally came with 3.8 seconds left in the game, when Ryan Petersen scored a power-play goal on an empty net.

Bounds made 32 saves for St. Scholastica, which is now 1-32-2 in the last 35 meetings with St. Norbert.

St. Norbert was 2-for-7 on the power play, while St. Scholastica was 0-for-6 with the extra man.