The Skating Dutchmen's 10-year anniversary celebration season continues!
Union, which joined the ECAC's Division I ice hockey league for the 1991-92 season, qualified for its second-straight postseason party when it finished ninth in the 12-team league. The 12-16-4 Garnet, which have been to the postseason five times in their Division I history, will travel to meet No. 2 St. Lawrence (16-12-4) this weekend in a best two-of-three series.
The opening face-off is set for 7 p.m. each night and can be heard on Union College radio station WRUC.
This is a rematch of last year's opening-round won by St. Lawrence, 8-4 and 4-3 in overtime. In fact, the Dutchmen will be looking to snap a 10-game losing streak at the hands of the Saints, who lead the overall series by a 21-8-2 margin. Union has not beaten St. Lawrence since posting a 2-1 decision at Appleton Arena on February 8, 1997.
It has been an up-and-down season for the Dutchmen. Union opened the campaign with a 6-1-2 record and received its first-ever national ranking as it climbed to No. 11. The next 13 games produced
a 1-11-1 mark which included a 10-game winless streak. Just when things seemed the darkest, the Dutchmen rebounded to pick up 11 league points by going 5-2-1 against ECAC competition. Heading into last weekend's regular-season finale, the Garnet thought it needed to come up with at least a tie against either Colgate or Cornell. However, despite losing both of those road games, Union earned the 9th seed over Vermont as both the Dutchmen and the Catamounts finished with ECAC records of 8-12-2. The Dutchmen's victories over No. 1 Clarkson (2-1), No. 3 Harvard (3-2), No. 4 Cornell (2-0), No.5 Dartmouth (4-3), No. 6 Rensselaer (4-2 as well as a 2-2 tie), No. 8 Yale (5-1), No. 10 Vermont (3-1) and No. 11 Colgate (4-2) gave Union the advantage. In fact, the only teams that the Garnet failed to defeat this year were St. Lawrence (6-0 and 5-2), No. 7 Princeton (3-2 and 7-2) and No. 12 Brown (6-3 and a 2-2 tie).
Union will have to overcome several historical facts if they are to advance to next Thursday's (March 15) play-in game at Lake Placid. First, the Dutchmen are 2-11-1 on the road this year including a 1-9-1 record against league opponents. Second, since the start of the ECAC tournament in 1962, St. Lawrence has been the home team for the opening round 13 times and have advanced in 11 of those seasons. The Saints are 19-4 in ECAC opening round games at Appleton Arena and have outscored the opposition 112-52 in those 23 games. Thirdly, the Saints are making their 17th consecutive appearance in the conference tournament and 28th overall. St. Lawrence, which is the defending champion,
have won five tournament titles and sports an all-time tournament record of 34-31-3. The Dutchmen, meanwhile, have lost seven consecutive Division I postseason games since winning their initial quarterfinal game at Rensselaer, 4-3, in 1993-94. The rest of that series produced RPI victories of 5-1 and 4-3. In 1994-95 Union dropped a 5-2 decision at Princeton in the preliminary game and in 1996-97 the Dutchmen lost at Rensselaer by identical 3-1 scores. On the positive side, this is a veteran Dutchmen squad, one that has the second most single-season wins in the last 10 years (the 1996-97 squad, which finished a team-best fifth in the circuit, won 18 games). The Garnet should not be in awe of the highly-regarded Saints, nor should they be intimidated by the St. Lawrence crowd.
Of the 19 players who were on last year's playoff team (not including goaltenders), a total of 10 picked up at least one point during the 1999-2000 series. Drew Taylor had a goal and three assists, Clark Jones two goals, Bryan Yackel one goal, and Charles Simard and Nathan Gillies contributed two assists to Union's attack. Jeff Hutchins, Randy Dagenais and Kris Goodjohn each had one assist.
As for goaltender Brandon Snee, he stood on his head to produce a 94-save weekend, 56 of which came in the second game. In fact, the Dutchmen had an opportunity to win the second night when they took a 3-2 lead into the final 50 seconds before St. Lawrence tied the game with their goaltender sitting on the bench.
Other than a three-goal outburst by the Saints in the third period of the first game, Union battled their more-established opponent very evenly.
The Dutchmen, who scored 83 goals this year (third highest in their Division I history), have 10 players in double digits including three 20-point scorers. Junior Jeff Wilson leads the team with his 21 points (11 goals 10 assists) while sophomore Kris Goodjohn (7-13) and senior Clark Jones (2-18) each have 20 points. Senior Jason Ralph leads the squad with his 13 goals, a career best. On the defensive side, the 105 goals allowed by the Dutchmen this year is the third lowest in the last 10 seasons. Snee heads into the weekend boasting a save percentage of 2.98 and a save percentage of .903. He
has one shutout this year and has given up two or less goals 15 times, including five one-goal games.
Union would like nothing better than to extend this anniversary season with their first-ever trip to Lake Placid. But in order to accomplish that goal, the Dutchmen are going to have to put together their finest two-game effort in their brief Division I history.
It promises to be an interesting weekend.