A new opponent will take the ice tonight against the Bowling Green hockey team. Findlay will travel to the BGSU Ice Arena for the first-ever meeting between the Falcons and the Oilers.
The Falcons (1-5-0) will try to snap a five game losing streak, while Findlay (2-0-0) will try to remain undefeated.
“Findlay is a real hard working team as well as a skilled team,” said head coach Scott Paluch. “We want to understand the work ethic necessary to win in all of our games.”
In order to understand this work ethic the team has been working on several things in practice that should help them win hockey games.
The Falcons have been practicing finishing checks, winning face-offs, capitalizing on the power play and eliminating the amount of goals allowed.
“In all six of our games so far both goalies have performed very well even with the amount of goals that went in over three of our last four games,” Paluch said.
The Falcons have allowed 24 goals in the past four games including a 6-5 loss to Western Michigan Oct. 11 and a 10-1 loss to Ferris State Oct. 18.
“We’re very excited about the play of our goaltenders,” Paluch said. “Both of the goaltenders have a tremendous work ethic in goal and are constantly working at getting better. They are working to eliminate those goals that went in last weekend.”
Senior goaltender Tyler Masters let in 10 goals last Friday night, while sophomore goalie Jordan Sigalet allowed five of his own Saturday including three power play goals, which may sound like a lot, but the Bulldogs fired 96 shots on net throughout the weekend.
As of late the Falcons have also struggled with the power play and are trying to get back to where they were at the start of the season — perfect on the penalty kill.
“Special teams is so important,” Paluch said. “At the beginning of the year our power play and penalty kill were off to such a good start. That was important because it put us in positions to win hockey games.”
The Falcons began the season killing off its opponents’ first 17 power plays. Last weekend, however, Ferris State scored four power play goals on 10 attempts, while the Falcons were unable to find the net with the man advantage.
The Falcons now have a penalty-kill percentage of .813 (26 of 32), 6th in the Central Collegiate Hockey Association. Heading into last weekend the Falcons were second in the CCHA with a .909 percentage (20 of 22).
“Ferris was a little better in the special teams than we were, which added to the result on the weekend,” Paluch said.
The Bulldogs scored an impressive 15 goals in two nights against the Falcons starting off with a goal 24 seconds into the game Friday.
“We weren’t really prepared for them,” said junior defenseman Kevin Bieksa. “The first period of the first game they came out flying. They scored in the first 30 seconds on the first shift. We just weren’t prepared mentally.”
Whether the Falcons were mentally prepared or not it was the breakdowns in the neutral zone that lead to the Bulldogs victory.
“Some breakdowns cost us goals,” Bieksa said. “We started to come back, then we had a breakdown and then they scored a goal. That was kind of the turning point, which was the fourth goal.”
Tonight, the Falcons are looking to eliminate breakdowns against Findlay and succeed on the power play.
Face-off is set for 7:05 p.m.
