(Photo: Gabrielle Mercer/WCSN)
A high-penalty game sent sparks flying between the two southernmost college hockey teams on Saturday with the Alabama-Huntsville Chargers coming out on top with a 3-1 victory over the Arizona State Sun Devils, crushing ASU’s hope at obtaining its first ever home sweep.
“It’s a classic case of too little too late,”ASU head coach Greg Powers said. “We’ve come out now, I think in our last four series here at Oceanside against division one teams, won Friday and it’s like the exact opposite of what we do on the road. It’s really just befuddling, to be honest.”
After an uneventful first period, ASU defenseman Brinson Pasichnuk opened up the scoring six minutes into the second with an unassisted power play goal, ASU’s second power play goal on the weekend and the Pasichnuk’s second of the season. Quickly after, the Chargers retaliated with a shot that sent goaltender Joey Daccord diving and ended with the puck in the back of the net.
Shortly after, when Huntsville was back at full strength, both teams found themselves in the middle of a brawl which landed four players in the box. ASU’s Jake Clifford and UAH’s Cam Knight and Madison Dunn all donned penalties for roughing while Steen Pasichnuk received a five minute major for boarding.
A short 5-on-3 play, with the Chargers having the advantage, gave Huntsville a second goal and the lead.
“They just had more time,” Daccord said. “They had more chances tonight and more opportunities for power plays so eventually, you know, they get an extra guy on the ice, they’re going to get the chance to score and they took advantage of it.”
Desperation was the leading factor in the final period as the Devils struggled to even up the scoring. By cutting back on the penalties, the Sun Devils were able to keep the puck in Charger zone, but more intensity and heavier hits weren’t enough to make any conversions when they were on the power play.
“You keep making excuses for a young team that just thinks it’s going to be easy the next day and we played desperate in the third and we just had the puck under stick a good four or five times there for the equalizer and couldn’t get it done,” Powers said.
The Sun Devils fell short in what they hoped would be their first ever home sweep. The battle of the Sun Belt teams finished with an empty net goal by the Chargers with under 30 seconds left in play.
ASU record fell to 2-6-2 after being outshot 33-18.
“That’s what’s so great about the game; you earn everything you get,” Powers said. “And the end result, really we didn’t earn a lead tonight and we were really lucky to get a lead and didn’t capitalize on it.”
The Sun Devils will not play next weekend. They will return against Penn State on Nov. 17 and 18 at Gila River Arena.
