Quinnipiac, Yale facing different pressures
HAMDEN — With a place in the NCAA tournament already secure there’s no pressure on the Quinnipiac men’s hockey team this weekend, a bonus considering the Bobcats open the ECAC quarterfinals Friday night severely shorthanded at defenseman.
Captain Chase Priskie, a Hobey Baker Award candidate, is suspended for two games of the best-of-3 series with Brown after a kicking penalty against Yale in the final regular season game. Luke Shiplo is out Friday night for fighting in the same game. And Brandon Fortunato was lost for the season after breaking his leg in practice last month.
As the No. 5 team in the PairWise Rankings, Quinnipiac can lose both games of its series with Brown and still earn a high seeding when the NCAA field of 16 is announced in two weeks.
Of course, there’s plenty of motivation for winning.
The Bobcats (25-7-2) are very much in contention for a No. 1 seed and need wins to overtake UMass, Minnesota State or Minnesota-Duluth for a top four slot.
Pride is also at stake. Quinnipiac has won four Cleary Cups as regular season champs in the past seven years, but claimed just one ECAC tournament championship, in 2016. And since joining the ECAC in 2005, the Bobcats have won at least one postseason series every year, a streak of 13 years, longest in conference history.
Brown (13-13-5) has never beaten the Bobcats in a playoff series, losing in the first round in 2008, 2010, 2011 and 2017. But Quinnipiac is vulnerable without Priskie, a dangerous scorer and its best defender, and Shiplo.
Marcus Chorney, whose played in only two games this season, and Zach Metsa will be called upon to fill in the holes. Along with regulars Cam Boudreau and Peter Dilberatore, the Bobcats will start four freshmen at defense.
YALE HEADS NORTH
Despite being two of the original members of ECAC Hockey, established in 1961, Yale and Clarkson have a relatively light yet welldefined playoff history. They’ve only met three times, the last in 1997, and the home team has advanced each time: Yale in two games at Ingalls Rink in 1987; Clarkson sweeping at Cheel Arena in 1991 and 1997.
There’s no question the Bulldogs (15-13-3) have little margin for error when the best-of-3 quarterfinal series begins Friday night in Potsdam, New York.
Clarkson (22-10-2) has two of the league’s most potent scorers in Nico Sturm (13 goals, 28 assists, 41 points) and Haralds Egle (17-18-35) and a first-rate goalie in Jake Kielly, who has five shutouts this season.
Yale knocked off the Golden Knights at Cheel on Dec. 1, and are coming off a strong first-round sweep of Rensselaer in which it outscored the Engineers 8-1 and snapped its power-play troubles with three goals on the man advantage.
“It’s nice when you have real success to lean on,” Yale coach Keith Allain said.
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