For the first time this season, the club hockey team dropped both games of a weekend series as the Ducks were swept by their biggest Pacific-8 Conference rivals this weekend, losing the season series with the Huskies 3-1.
On Saturday night, Washington thoroughly outplayed the Ducks and skated to 4-1 victory to capture the I-5 cup — the trophy awarded to the winner of the season series between the rivals — for the second consecutive year. Head coach Eddie LeRoy said the Ducks simply did not match the Huskies’ intensity.
“I think we just got outworked,” he said. “Talent-wise we match up with these guys, but we just didn’t seem to show up tonight to play hockey. We just got outworked in everything; they got to the loose pucks.”
LeRoy also said the Huskies played very well on special teams, killing every penalty and converting on a high percentage of their own power plays.
The one goal that the Ducks did score on Saturday came with less than five minutes left in the game, and while it was a relief for the Ducks not to get shut out, it did little to change LeRoy’s opinion of the game.
“It’s a good thing to get a goal, but I don’t think it means that much,” LeRoy said. “We got outworked no matter what. If it was 3-1 we still got outworked, if it was 2-1 we still got outworked. It ended up a 4-1 final, and they deserved to win. They badly outplayed us.”
On Friday night the Ducks jumped out to a 2-0 lead at the first intermission and dominated the Huskies in the first period. Halfway through the second period, a skirmish in front of the Washington net left one player from each team ejected.
The Ducks’ Matt Hanlon and the Huskies’ Andrew Johnson were each suspended for the second game of the series as a result of the fight. Johnson was also suspended an additional game for making contact with an official.
Early in the third period the Huskies scored two goals in a just over a minute, capitalizing on a rule change made by the American Collegiate Hockey Association at the start of the year.
Just under four minutes into the third period, Washington scored while the Ducks were serving a delayed penalty (meaning the actual penalty would not start until the Ducks touched the puck).
Under the previous rule, Washington’s goal would have waived off the penalty, but because of the rule change the Ducks still had to serve the penalty. Halfway through the ensuing powerplay, the Huskies scored to take a 4-3 lead.
LeRoy said that as frustrating it was, the referees made the correct call under ACHA and NCAA rules.
In earlier competition this season, the Ducks went 2-1 on their road trip to Utah, splitting two games with Weber State and beating BYU.
The Ducks opened the trip on Jan. 14, beating Weber State 6-4 before facing off against BYU the next day. Oregon skated to a 5-3 win over the Cougars but dropped Sunday’s game against Weber State. In their 3-1 loss to Weber State, the Ducks had a multitude of chances on the power play but were not able to convert.
LeRoy said Sunday’s loss may have been a product of overconfidence with the Ducks coming off a win over a stronger BYU team the night before.
“I think we probably took Weber for granted in that third game,” he said, “and I think we somewhat took the night off. I think we came in a little bit flat and anticipated that we were gonna win like we did on Friday night against them.”
The Ducks host Washington State this weekend, with a 10 p.m. start time on Friday and a 4 p.m. game on Saturday afternoon. Oregon dominated the Cougars in October, sweeping a two game series by scores of 9-1 and 8-0.
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Ducks fall to Huskies in two matches over past weekend
Daily Emerald
January 23, 2011
Alex McDougall
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