Wayne State Skates Past Niagara, 3-1

The Wayne State University men's hockey team won its seventh consecutive game against Niagara University Saturday (Feb. 9) with a 3-1 victory in New York.

The Warriors improve to 14-11-3 overall and 10-2-2 in College Hockey America, while the Purple Eagles fall to 15-13-0 overall and 6-7-0 in the league.

WSU scored just 77 seconds into the contest when Jack Redwood (Trenton, MI/Compuware Ambassadors) scored off of a pass from Chris Vail (Grosse Pointe Farms, MI/Vernon Vipers). The Vail-Maxim Starchenko-Redwood line produced four goals on the weekend, two each night.

At the 2:57 mark of the opening stanza, Vail stole the puck from a PurpleEagles defenseman and scored his seventh of the campaign to make it 2-0 Wayne State.

Niagara's Ryan Gale received a pass from Chris Welch and snapped a wrist shot by Warrior netminder David Guerrera (St. Leonard, QUE/Estevan Bruins) to cut the WSU lead in half at 2-1 midway through the first period.

Wayne State would score the only goal of the middle stanza despite being outshot 9-7. Freshman Nathan Rosychuk (Athabasca, ALB/Grande Prairie Storm) recorded his eighth of the season during a WSU power play with assists from Dusty Kingston (Spencerville, ONT/Brockville Braves) and Tyler Kindle (Portage, MI/Bozeman Icedogs).

Neither team would score in the final period despite the Purple Eagles flurry that saw the Eagles outshoot the Warriors 12-4.

Guerrera finished the contest with 27 saves including 12 in the third period. Rob Bonk made 12 saves for Niagara. WSU went one-for-two with the man-advantage and killed all five NU power play chances.

Wayne State faces CHA foe Findlay in a home-and-home series next weekend (Feb. 15-16). Friday's contest is in Ohio, while Saturday's rematch is slated for 7:05 p.m. at the Great Lakes Sports City Arena in Fraser, Michigan.

---

Wayne State Remains
In First With 5-2 Win At Niagara

Niagara University, NY - The Wayne State University men's hockey team won its third straight conference game by recording a 5-2 victory at Niagara on Friday, Feb. 8.

The first place Warriors reeled off three goals in the first six and a half minutes of play and the host Purple Eagles never fully recovered.

The scoring started only 2:50 into the contest when Wayne State's Jon Brink (Portage, MI/West Michigan Warriors) scored his eighth goal of the season when he fired home a perfect pass from blueliner Tyler Kindle (Portage, MI/Bozeman Icedogs) to make it 1-0. Less than a minute later Jack Redwood (Trenton, MI/Compuware Ambassadors) would score his seventh goal of the season when he fired home a blast fromthe left point off of the stick of Chris Vail (Grosse Pointe Farms, MI/Vernon Vipers) to increase the lead to 2-0.

The third Wayne State goal would come exactly three minutes later when Redwood returned the favor, setting Vail up with a cross-crease pass that he only had to tip by Niagara netminder Rob Bonk to pad the Warrior lead 3-0. Vail's goal, his sixth of the season, proved to be the eventual game-winner.

Niagara would come out firing in the second period, outshooting its opponents 15-7 in the period. However, both teams would get one goal each, and the Purple Eagles squandered a two-man advantage midway through the period, and would find themselves headed to the third period trailing 4-1.

Niagara opened the second period scoring when Matt Ryan stuffed home an initial shot from John Heffernan to give Niagara its first goal of the contest. The Purple Eagles controlled the period, but a defensive lapse near the end of the period allowed John Grubb (Burlington, ND/Waterloo Black Hawks) to skate into the Niagara zone uncontested and fire home a slap shot that beat Niagara netminder Rob Bonk five hole to make it 4-1 in favor of the Warriors.

The third period saw the Purple Eagles once again strike first as Jordan Meloff scored his first goal of the season off of a beautiful pass from Scott Crawford.

The Warriors got a late goal from Maxim Starchenko (Kharkov, Ukraine/Powell River Kings) at the 16:11 mark to close out the scoring making.

Wayne State remains in first place with a 9-2-2 league mark and a 13-11-3 overall record. Niagara falls to 15-12-0 overall and 6-6-0 in the CHA

The two teams skate again Saturday, Feb. 9 at the Dwyer Arena at 7:05 p.m.