QU’s Pecknold gets 600th win
HAMDEN — It’s win 19 this season, win one of a hoped-for two at this Connecticut Ice tournament, a victory to snap what for Quinnipiac men’s hockey is a losing streak.
It’s also coach Rand Pecknold’s 600th victory. The Bobcats contained Sacred Heart at M&T Bank Arena to win 5-0 Friday night and advance to Saturday’s final.
Pecknold is 600-336-106 in 29 seasons at the school.
“I would’ve liked it last weekend, you know, but stuff happens,” Pecknold quipped; his team lost at Cornell and Colgate a week ago. “I feel really lucky to have the support I’ve had here at Quinnipiac.
“It’s a nice reward,” he added, “but we’ve got to reload and get ready for 601.”
Quinnipiac (19-3-3), ranked third in one national poll and fourth in the other, faced No. 12 UConn (16-7-3) in the final on Saturday night. The Huskies beat Yale 6-1 in Friday’s opener.
Sacred Heart (12-10-2) facd Yale (3-13-4) in the consolation game on Saturday.
Both tournament games aired on SNY. Quinnipiac, which had held off on announcing both a name for the tournament and its broadcast information, said Friday morning that it would be basically status quo: Connecticut Ice, airing on SNY, which had presented the tournament in 2020 and 2022 at Total Mortgage Arena in Bridgeport.
“It’s a fun tournament,” said Quinnipiac grad student T.J. Friedmann, part of a team that lost to Sacred Heart in the 2020 CT Ice final and that won the 2022 championship.
“It’s our third one now for all the fifth-years. It’s been growing every year, I think, and the games have always been competitive. It’s a good little thing to piece together for the state of Connecticut and for hockey in general.”
Yaniv Perets made 17 saves for his fifth shutout of the year and 16th in two seasons. Sophomore transfer and leading scorer Collin Graf scored twice for Quinnipiac, including the opening goal that Pecknold thought turned the tide after the Pioneers had some juice early.
Graf and a Sacred Heart defender went to chase down a Sam Lipkin play off the boards into the Pioneers zone. The defender had his stick on it first, but Graf took it away, took it to the net and slid it past Luke Lush 6:51 into the game.
“It was important to get out there and set the tone early, to get back to the way we can play” after last weekend’s losses, Graf said. “The mood in the room this week was optimistic. We wanted to go out and win this championship.”
Ethan de Jong and Joey Cipollone scored in the second. Graf and Friedmann scored in the third.
“There aren’t many positives. We just couldn’t get our game going tonight,” Sacred Heart coach C.J. Marottolo said. “We weren’t moving our feet. We weren’t physical. Way too many turnovers. When did get a little bit of an offensive break, we had no juice left in the tank.”
UConn blitzed Yale in the first game. The Bulldogs hit a post early in the first period, and the game was never so close again. The Huskies scored three power-play goals in the first 25 minutes to take a 4-0 lead and tacked on two more goals late in the second period, the second by South Windsor’s Jake Veilleux, a sophomore.
“The power play was on point tonight,” UConn coach Mike Cavanaugh said. “It’s probably also a combination of just catching Yale when they’re not at their best.
“Sometimes you have those nights,” he added. “We’re certainly not 6-0 better than (Yale) after two periods.”
The Huskies’ Chase Bradley received a major and game misconduct for contact to the head in the third period. Quinton Ong broke up Arsenii Sergeev’s shutout with two seconds left in the fiveminute penalty.
NHL draft prospect Matthew Wood had a goal and two assists.