In its last home series before winter break, Oregon club hockey fell twice this weekend to San Diego State.
“We knew they (SDSU) were pretty good…we knew they would get a lot of shots,” said goalie Danny Cockriel. “We played them pretty tough on Friday and I thought we could have won that game.”
Coming off three tough losses at the San Jose Showcase, the Ducks lost to the Aztecs on Friday 5-3 and 4-0 Saturday.
On Friday, San Diego State got off to a quick start, scoring in the first 40 seconds with a goal from Travis Sevilla.
The Aztecs came out aggressive and quick, creating a lot of pressure for the Ducks’ defense and Cockriel.
“They crashed the net really hard…They were hacking me a lot, every time of covered it,” Cockriel said.
Cockriel believed that the team played pretty well on Friday, but struggled defensively the second game.
“We made a lot of turnovers that cost us. When we make mistakes they are bad mistakes and other teams capitalize on it,” Cockriel said.
Oregon struggled on offense during the first period, as San Diego State controlled most of the possession.
In the second period, Oregon got on the board with just under a minute and a half of play with a goal from Trevor Shott off the deflection of Terran Donnelly’s shot from just above the blue line.
With senior Connor McBride out, Shott is playing on a new line with Trevor McCarty and Alex Sulitzer and has seen a lot of action.
“Sully and Trevor McCarty are good players so its fun playing with them,” Shott said. “It’s good to know that the coach has confidence in me to go play with the first line.”
After a penalty for charging on San Deigo State’s John Riley, Oregon was able to take advantage of the power play. A shot from Michael Luke was deflected off Aztecs goalie Filip Curkovic and Jake Yale was there for the rebound to give the Ducks a 2-1 lead.
San Diego State was able to respond quickly with a goal just less than a minute later from Hunter Johnson.
The second period was fairly choppy, as both teams racked up a combined 10 penalties in the period.
With five minutes left in the second period, the Ducks went on the power play again with a two-man advantage. Nick Sciabarra was able to skate through the the Aztec defense and score with a backhand shot, bringing Oregon’s lead to 3-2.
However, San Diego State was not going down without a fight and came back with a goal from Cody Nieuwenhuis with 3:03 left in the third period.
With 31 seconds left to play Nieuwenhuis passed the puck across the ice to Christian Gerritts, setting him up for a wide open shot against Cockriel. Gerritts took a hard shot, beating Cockriel stick-side to give San Diego State the 4-3 lead.
Oregon pulled the goalie for a final effort at the tie, but San Diego was able to score into the empty net, winning 5-3.
The Aztecs finished Friday’s game with 48 shots. The Ducks tallied 38.
On Saturday, the Ducks were once again outshot by San Diego State 53-31.
“We couldn’t get it out of our zone and we when could we were too tired so we had to dump it (the puck) and change and that allowed them to break out easily and we couldn’t get any offensive pressure and didn’t get a lot of chances,” Shott said.
San Diego was the first to score at 11:11 as Brandon Neveu scored.
In the second period, the Aztecs picked up two more goals and the Ducks trailed 3-0 heading into the final period.
Although Oregon picked up some offensive pressure as the game continued, it wasn’t enough to catch up as San Diego State took another win in Eugene.
“We need to pick it up for sure…we can’t be throwing the puck around like we were,” defenseman Joe Hoover said. “We need to get the tempo up and talk more…we come out slow in the first and then try to pick it up in the second or third, but sometimes it’s a little too late.”
With many players facing injuries, the Ducks will look forward to the time to get healthy over winter break.
“We are all kinda of low, but we don’t let it get to us,” Shott said. “We still have more games in the season and we are going to go out and play as hard as we can every game.”
The team will face UCLA at home on Jan. 9 and 10.
Follow on Beth Maiman on Twitter @bethmaiman