Vikings Hockey Clinch Bid to Nationals

The Vikings men’s ice hockey team defeated Broome 2-0 last Wednesday, giving them an automatic bid to play in the national tournament.

“I think we played pretty well tonight. I thought the effort level was there tonight. The shots indicated that. We out shot them by quit a few,” said Head Coach Matt Alvey.

“We played well, today’s game was basically whether or not we clinch our bid to nationals, so it was a pretty big game,” said freshman Defender Jordan Simpson.

Both teams were pretty evenly matched during the first period. “We came out a little slow tonight, but I think overall we played very well. I\u2019m happy with the victory and the guys were really moving,” said sophomore Goalie Matt Crescione.

The Vikings came into this game coming off of a big 20-2 victory in their last game against Mohawk Valley. “[It’s] not all the time you see 20 goals scored in a game. It really showed our offensive power. We’re a very offensive team. We have a lot of guys who can put the puck in the net and we work really well together. When you can do that against a bad team and then come out and get a big win against a good team, it shows that we are on the right page,” said Crescione.

“One thing I was hoping was that we wouldn’t come into this game and overlook it. Beating a team by 20 goals, you think your team might be a little relaxed, but I thought the effort level was there tonight,” said Alvey.

The team got ahead in the game early, and ended the first period with a 1-0 lead, with a goal midway through the first on a shorthanded goal by freshman Forward James Murphy.

The Vikings came out much stronger in the second period, controlling most of the period with possession and shots, but the Vikings were unable to take advantage of 2-on-1 opportunities.

“You’re hoping your goal scorers will come up big and get a goal on one or two of them. Unfortunately tonight their goal tender was playing very well, but our guys were bearing down and stuck through and came away with a win,” said Alvey.

The Vikings ended the period with two more penalties and had five on the night, but were still able to hold on for an impressive defensive performance. “I thought we played good defensively. We only gave up about 15 shots or so and that just shows the guys were working hard,” Alvey said.

The Vikings were effective in their penalty kills. Broome went 0/5 on their power plays. “I think our confidence has been pretty good all year with our penalty kill. Each game it’s getting better and better and it always builds confidence within your team when you kill of penalties.

“The defense stepped up a lot, they worked really hard, even the forwards coming down and supporting them definitely helped us as a unit,” said Simpson.

Hudson Valley tallied up an insurance goal in the third period when James Murphy recorded his second goal of the night, while Jordan Simpson recorded his second assist.

Broome had a couple chances to come back, but Crescione was strong in net for the Vikings and was able to pull out the shutout. Crescione gives much credit to the defense for his shutout.

“My defense played absolutely amazing tonight. It\u2019s not often you get a shutout in a game, but when you do, it\u2019s a lot on the defensive part. It was the defensive taking care of the guys in the corners, the chips off the glass. All of that goes into a shutout, and a big team win,” said Crescione.

With the win, it is the second time the Vikings have defeated the Bruins this season. They face them one last time later in the season, in hopes for the sweep.

“Beating a team three times in a season is always tough. We’re just going to have to go out and continue with the same mentality, go out work hard, get shots on goal, and hopefully the bounces go our way,” said Alvey.

“Looking for the sweep, it’s always nice. Everyday we’re going to go at it and just take it one game at a time until we make it to nationals,” said Simpson.

Hudson Valley hopes to continue its success en route to nationals. “We hope to continue to win, [and] as I told my players in the meeting after the game, this was a game that pretty much put us into the national tournament today by winning. We just have to keep on winning to keep some momentum going into nationals,” said Alvey.

“We build off this win. We don’t go down from this. We keep going forward. We know what we have to do as a team to take the cup home,\u201d said Crescione.

The Vikings look to continue their winning ways as they get closer to nationals when they face Mohawk Valley today at home.