Bowling Green Hockey was swept by the Northern Michigan Wildcats on senior day weekend, falling to the Wildcats 4-2 both Friday and Saturday night at Slater Family Ice Arena.

Going into Friday, the Falcons entered the night in third place only needing two points to clinch the third place spot in the CCHA standings. Right behind them were the Wildcats, trailing behind by only five points.

Brett Pfoh wasted no time lighting the lamp for BG, sending the first puck through off a nice shot from a deflection.  

But minutes later, NMU’s A.J. Vanderbeck buried one in the back of the net to square things up at 1-1.

With just over a minute left in the first period, Austen Swankler continued his hot season as he scored his 18th goal of the year. The Falcons went into the first intermission up 2-1.  

Northern Michigan’s Michael Van Unen tied it up midway through the second as a shot initially saved by Christian Stoever, butt a rebound off of his pad had the puck right on Unen‘s stick as he tied things back up 2-2.  

The scoring didn’t stop there for the Wildcats as in the third period, Tanner Vescio gave the Wildcats their first lead of the game with almost half a period left.  

Despite the efforts at the end, NMU sealed the deal via a Kristof Papp with an empty netter to win the Friday duel, 4-2. 

In Saturday’s contest, Slater Family Ice Arena had it’s second largest crowd of the year with 4,498, just behind the Ohio State game. The night also featured the return of hometown hero Scott Hamilton, who dropped the ceremonial puck.

The game remained scoreless until five minutes left in the first period. That was when Zach Vinnell’s blue line blast was tipped into the back of the net by Ethan Scardina, giving the Falcons a 1-0 lead.

With under seven minutes left in the second, NMU tied things up as Andre Ghantous went coast-to-coast on the ice and beat Stoever.

The tie did not last long, however, as Falcon senior Nathan Burke gave BG the lead 15 seconds later after Barber found him crashing the net perfectly to beat the Wildcat netminder.

NMU tied it two minutes into the third, as Alex Frye intercepted a puck in the offensive zone, who then found David Keefer in front of the net, tying the game at two.

Halfway through the third, both teams would have a guy in the penalty box, and while playing four-on-four hockey,  NMU scored the eventual game winner. David Collela dropped a pass to Keefer, and he would bury a goal.

Late in the third, BG pulled Stoever, and with the man advantage, it appeared that Taylor Schneider tied it as a puck that went off the post made the lamp light premature.

In the chaos of the ref’s no-goal call, Ghantous found the empty net, ending the game 4-2.

Head coach Ty Eigner was pleased with the team’s effort despite the regular season finale sweep.

“It was a good hockey game, we were doing a lot of good things like the penalty kill and a really good second goal by Nathan Burke to answer back. The crowd was into it, unfortunately we turned the puck over in the neutral zone and we talked about how we wanted to play those plays and Northern Michigan would make a play to tie it up.”

The Falcons will be back at the Slater Family Ice Arena next weekend for the quarterfinals of the CCHA playoffs, where they will play Ferris State in a best-of-three series. Game one’s puck drop is set for March 3 at 7:07.