Although the score might not have shown it, Sunday night’s hockey game between Bowling Green and Notre Dame was much different and a lot closer than Saturday night’s game.
The Falcons lost to the Irish 5-2 Sunday night, but did not allow a single power-play goal. On Saturday Notre Dame scored four power play goals to defeat the Falcons 6-3.
Heading into Sunday’s game, the Falcons knew they were going to have to change the way they played when short-handed if they wanted to win the game. They also knew that they were going to have to try and make something happen on the power play. Bowling Green did both of these.
“Going into Sunday, we wanted to make sure we really clamped down on our penalty kill and gave ourselves some chances on the power play,” said head coach Scott Paluch. “We certainly did that. Our penalty kill was excellent on Sunday and we scored on the power play.”
BG went 1-for-7 on the power play and held Notre Dame scoreless on their six power-play attempts.
The Falcons’ first goal was a power play goal at the 9:34 mark in the first period to tie the game at 1-1. Notre Dame scored their first goal 20 seconds into the game.
“The first goal was our power-play goal,” Paluch said. “We had a great play from [Brian] Escobedo, who fired it down to the net and Mike Falk tipping it in at the near post. It was a real good power play goal.”
Then halfway through the second period the Falcons found themselves in the lead for the first time on a goal by captain D’Arcy McConvey.
“Our second goal was actually a strange play off the 4-on-4,” Paluch said. “Their defenseman kind of mishandled the puck behind the net. It came out in front to D’Arcy McConvey, who was able to just poke it off the side of the net, off their goaltender and into the net.”
However, luck did not stay very long on the Falcons side. The Fighting Irish tied the game up with six minutes left in the second period.
The Irish got a lucky break on their third goal, which deflected off a Bowling Green defenseman at 15:35 in the second period. Notre Dame scored their last two goals in the final period.
The Falcons outshot the Fighting Irish 49-45. This was the first time this season that the Falcons lost a game when they held the lead in shot attempts. The 49 shots attempted was a season-high for BG. It was the most shot attempts since Nov. 24, 2001 when the Falcons recorded 51 shots against Lake Superior (BG lost 3-2).
“We created as many chances as we have in a game all year we just could not finish,” Paluch said. “We had a lot of tremendous chances. We just couldn’t score.”
Bowling Green goaltender Tyler Masters stopped 40 of 45 shots, while Notre Dame goaltender Morgan Cey recorded a career-high 47 saves.
“It was a solid game for Ty,” Paluch said. “It’s been a while since he played with the break and they actually scored on their first shot. It was a big part of the game, him being able to rebound. I thought he did that well.”
