By Brittany Burke

In a third period effort to gain control of the puck and lengthen their lead over the University of New Haven in the second round of the Connecticut Governor’s Cup, Senior Captain Joe Dabkowski endured a collision with the boards.

The rink became silent as the sound of a loud crash filled the air. Dabkowski laid still face down on the ice for several minutes behind UNH’s net, lifting his head every few moments as a sign that the crash had not resulted in a head or neck injury.

After being checked out by the team trainer, Dabkowski was able to skate off the ice on his own, but was taken out of the game.

“The trainers are saying it’s a dislocation in his hand, two bones. He splinted it, and went to the hospital, so we’ll see,” said Head Coach Ben Adams. “Depending on how severe it is, I know Joe and he’s probably going to do everything in his power to rehab it real quick or just play through it.”

The loss of Dabkowski was seemingly the only glitch in the 9-1 win against the UNH club hockey team Saturday night.

CCSU maintained a 6-0 lead over UNH throughout the first two periods, not letting the team score their one and only goal until early in the third. The Blue Devils maintained more shots on goal and kept control of the puck.

“We just had to throw a lot of pucks on net to see what happens,” said Thomas Carroll. He pulled off a hat trick and two assists for the night.

CCSU was able to cut down on their penalties, a problem that caused them to lose the first round of the mini tournament against University of Connecticut 5-4.

“They minimized mistakes, they weren’t in the penalty box much. We capitalized on our opportunity on the power play, and overall we got more pucks on the net,” said Coach Adams of his team’s performance against UNH.

UNH came out skating hard playing good defense, looking for a comeback win after their Friday night blowout loss against Western Connecticut State University. The lost 13-3. Despite their tough play, the Blue Devils defense was able to force them into situations they were not comfortable with, allowing them to take advantage and come away with points.

“Defensemen were stepping up, taking ice away on the blue lines, enforcing the dump, which they’re not a dump and chase-type team so it’s good to see,” said Coach Adams. “And you know, [Ross] Mocko is our best defenseman back there. He made some big saves and really controlled the rebounds well tonight, as opposed to last night.”

CCSU finished off their win with a goal in the final seconds of the game scored by Eric Blewett, his second for the night, and assisted by Carroll.

CCSU came out in their rematch game against UNH looking for the win that they had let go in the first round against the UConn Huskies.

The Blue Devils began the game against UConn strong with two back-to-back unassisted goals made by Dabkowski. The first goal came just two minutes and 10 seconds into the game and the second breakaway goal was scored just 19 seconds later.

“We were kind of starting a little slow, for whatever reason I had two good opportunities, and found a variable on a breakaway, which I’ve been struggling, which is good,” Dabkowski said. “We just had trouble carrying that momentum throughout the game, and we started to pick it up later on, but it was a little too late.”

The Blue Devils are a team who scores in spurts, and that was evident in their game against UConn. After the initial two goals were made by Dabkowski they had trouble connecting, and couldn’t score again until there was 14:49 left in the second. Freshman, Jonathan Knobloch scored their only goal in the second with help from sophomore Jeff Pease and senior Erich Stoneman.

With 9:07 left to play in the second Co-Captain Mike DiClemente was taken out of the game for a major game misconduct, leaving a major hole in the team’s overall play.

“Obviously he’s one of our top guys – one of those players we have great chemistry with on our line, but whenever you lose a guy who’s playing a good number of minutes it’s gonna be tough on the team, and guys got to step up,” said Dabkowski.

DiClemente was out for the rest of the first game but came back on Saturday with two goals and an assist.

Despite the loss of DiClemente, CCSU scored a late fourth goal in the third made by Ryan Paglinco from Blewett and Carroll, but the spark wasn’t enough for the win.

The Blue Devils ended the mini tournament 1-1 with the loss against UConn and win versus UNH.

They are on a one week break and then are back on their home ice on Dec. 5 at 7:30 p.m. versus Endicott College.