Green Knights Return to Action With Win at Concordia

From Sports Information Director, January 8, 2010 | Men's Hockey
by Dan Lukes, dan.lukes@snc.edu, (920) 403-4077

MOORHEAD, Minn. - St. Norbert College returned from a 33-day break between games with a sound 4-2 win over Concordia-Moorhead College in a non-conference game at a frigid Moorhead Sports Center.

St. Norbert, which last played in a 4-2 win over the College of St. Scholastica on Dec. 5, improved to 11-2-1 overall with the win. The Green Knights are ranked fourth in this week's USCHO.com Division III Poll. The host Cobbers fell to 3-9-2.

The Green Knights came out strong, outshooting Concordia 14-2 in the first period. St. Norbert would get a 1-0 lead after the first 20 minutes when Noah Nemgar scored his first collegiate goal off assists from Johan Ryd and Scott Pulak at 14:58.

St. Norbert scored 34 seconds into the second period when Cody Keefer scored his eighth goal of the season, getting assists from Ryd and Pulak. The Cobbers would score a power-player marker by Jared Collen at 5:20, but St. Norbert answered 1:20 later when Mike Bernardy scored his third marker of the season. Shane Wheeler and Nick Tabisz assisted. Dylan Exton scored his second goal of the year with Nemgar and Jason Nopper assisting at 16:40 for a 4-1 lead.

Concordia would score the third period's only goal when Shawn Goos scored on the power play with 56 seconds left.

St. Norbert owned a 38-25 shots-on-goal advantage, and was 0-for-2 on the power play. B.J. O'Brien made 23 saves to improve to 11-1-1 on the year. Concordia, which was 2-for-3 on the power play, got 34 saves from Jacob Vatnsdal.

The game was played in a tidy 1 hour 55 minutes, with the game-time temperature outdoors at the opening draw at 4-below zero.