Men's Hockey ices MASCAC opponents

The Panthers of Plymouth State are on a roll in Massachusetts State Collegiate Athletic Conference play. The Men's Hockey team defeated both Framingham State and Westfield State last week. The wins bring their conference record up to 7-5, and they are now 9-10 overall.

To get to where PSU is now, the Panthers had an up-and-down winter session. They lost to tough out-of-conference opponents Amherst College and Milwaukee School of Engineering. Both of these games, played at the Norwich Tournament in Vermont, were games that Plymouth battled extremely tough. While these could be classified as morale wins, the Panthers knew that they had the ability to improve their 4-8 record at that point of the year.

Against Wentworth, Plymouth started to gain some momentum. Zach Fox (Sandown, NH), Chad Barthelmess (Norristown, PA), Mike Freitag (Westmont, IL), Ian McGilvrey (Omaha, NE), and Josh Woody (Sunderland, MD) found the back of the net for the green and white, while goalie Gordon Ceasar (Oak Park, CA), who transferred midway through the season from Utica College, had 28 saves in the 5-1 victory. This was the first win for the Panthers on their home ice against Wentworth since the 2005-2006 season.

A 3-2 loss against Salem State followed the Wentworth victory, but the Panthers played a scrappy, grind-it-out game against Fitchburg State in which they won, 4-1 down in Massachusetts. This game, which featured a number of hard hits, was one in which Andrew Wigg (Lantz, N.S.) started the game off with a goal about eight minutes into the contest. After Fitchburg tied up the score at 1-1, the Panthers had a number of timely goals. Colt Smelstor (Fairfax, VT), Fox, and Mike Economos (Crystal Lake, IL) each had a goal in the last 12 minutes of the contest to propel PSU to the win. Ceasar was phenomenal in goal, as he had 29 saves on 30 shots.  The Panthers followed this game up with a 3-0 win over UMass Dartmouth. Ceasar had 25 saves in the shutout.

Plymouth was able to capture two of their next three games to bring their record to 9-10. The most recent two being games against Framingham and Westfield. Both teams were in the top three of the conference when PSU played them, but both wins have propelled the Panthers into 2^nd-place in the MASCAC.

With Plymouth having gained a number of points over the last few weeks, this makes the rest of their games in the regular season that more critical, starting with Salem State on Thursday (Feb. 6). Salem, who currently hold first place in the MASCAC by one point, will be looking to stay in first so they won't have to travel to the depths of Hanaway Arena in New Hampshire during the conference tournament. As anyone who has been to a hockey game this year knows, the crowds that opponents have to deal/tolerate with can be brutal. Being able to clinch home-ice advantage throughout the MASCAC tournament in March is crucial for PSU chances to win the post-season title again, as they did in 2012.