Dartmouth Men's Hockey Travels to Providence, Stays Home for Boston College

HANOVER, N.H. - The No. 20 Dartmouth men's hockey team will spend its Thanksgiving break traveling to Providence on Friday before coming home for a Saturday matchup with defending national champs, No. 5/6 Boston College.

SCOUTING PROVIDENCE
Providence is currently on a nine-game nonwinning streak, having dropped its last five games. The Friars are 2-9-1 with its only victories coming early in the season against Bowling Green and Holy Cross. PC has been outscored, 134-68. Matt Bergland is the team leader with 12 points. Matt Taormina is second with eight points while John Cavanagh is the top goal scorer with four and has seven points. In goal a pair of netminders have backstopped Providence. Justin Gates has played in 10 games with a 1-7-1 record while Chris Mannix has played in five games with a 1-2-0 record. Gates has a 3.98 GAA and an .849 save percentage. Mannix has a 4.27 GAA and an .857 save percentage.

VERSUS PROVIDENCE
Providence holds a slight 14-8 advantage in the series that began with a 6-2 Dartmouth win in 1953. The Big Green have won the most recent contests with four victories in the last six meetings. The last time these two met was on Dec. 10, 1999 as PC walked away with a 2-0 win. Dartmouth's last victory was on Dec. 11, 1998, a 6-5 overtime win in Hanover.

SCOUTING BOSTON COLLEGE
Boston College comes to Thompson Arena as the defending national champions. The Eagles are currently ranked fifth and sixth in both national polls and has a 7-4-1 overall record, 5-3-1 in Hockey East. BC started off with a pair of non conference wins, a 5-4 victory over Wisconsin and a 5-3 defeat of Bowling Green. Boston College's first league game was a 4-3 loss to Northeastern before the Eagles bounced back to take a 3-2 win over Vermont along with 4-1 and 4-3 victories over Merrimack. A three-game non-winning skid against Notre Dame (1-4), Maine (1-2) and Merrimack (5-5) have been the only bumps BC has experienced so far as the Eagles recently have defeated UNH (8-6) and split a pair with UMass (2-0 and 3-4). Senior captain Brock Bradford and sophomore Brian Gibbons are the high scorers as Bradford leads his squad with 20 points and Gibbons has added 16. Bradford has scored 12 goals, five of those have come on the power play and he's currently third nationally in scoring. In net John Muse has handled all the duties. The sophomore has a 3.04 GAA and a .894 save percentage.

VERSUS BOSTON COLLEGE
Dartmouth and Boston College began playing in 1921. The Eagles won that first contest, 4-0 but the Big Green bounced back to take 16 of the next 25 matchups. Since that time BC has pretty much dominated the series, holding a 60-29 lead.Since Bob Gaudet has been coaching his teams have gone 1-2 against Boston College. The last Big Green win was on Nov. 26, 2002, a 5-4 overtime victory in Thompson Arena.

TOY DRIVE
The Boston College game will be a chance for fans of all ages to bring a new, unwrapped toy to Thompson Arena. The Big Green will be taking the toys to the Childrens Hospital at Dartmouth (CHaD) for a visit in December. Any fan that brings a toy will have a chance to enter a drawing for a signed hockey stick.

UP NEXT
Dartmouth will take a few weeks off, traveling to Denmark and Sweden for four games before taking on Army in the first day of the Big Green's Ledyard National Bank Classic on Dec. 28 and 29. UMass and Bemidji State will play in the opening game of the tourney.

LAST TIME OUT
Dartmouth lost its first league contest since the opening game of the season as the Big Green split last weekend, defeating Colgate (1-0) and then losing to Cornell (3-1).

THE RANKINGS
Dartmouth has ented the national poll this week for the the first time this season. After a victory over Colgate and a loss to Cornell last week the Big Green earned enough votes to be rankd #20 nationally in the USCHO/CBS College Sports Poll. Dartmouth is also earning votes in the Inside College Hockey poll.

OH SNAP
Dartmouth had its five-game win streak snapped in a loss to Cornell on Nov. 22. The five games was the longest for the Big Green since stringing five together from Feb. 16 to March 10, 2007.

WHO'S SCORING NEXT?
The usual suspects scored the two goals for the Big Green against Colgate and Cornell. Adam Estoclet and Andrew Owsiak teamed up for both scores. Doug Jones and Joe Stejskal also scored two points as Estoclet and Jones both scored goals.

PILING IT ON
In its last six games the Big Green has potted 21 goals and leads the league in scoring.

STREAKING
Adam Estoclet in on a six-game scoring streak, potting all 12 of his points in that span while Andrew Owsiak has scored in the last two contests. Doug Jones had a seven-game streak snapped with nine points against Colgate. Joe Stejskal had his six-game streak stopped against Cornell. He had scored eight points in that span.

100-GAMES
Forward Rob Pritchard played in his 100th game on Nov. 14 against St. Lawrence.

NETTING A NETMINDER
Freshman Jody O'Neill is helping the Big Green replace its starting goaltender of the last three seasons, Mike Devine. O'Neill won five straight games before picking up his first loss against Cornell. The rookie has had two 40+ save performances already this season. He racked up 47 against Union and had 42 against SLU.

JODY OH
Jody O'Neill's 47 saves against Union was the first time since Mike Devine had 44 against Colgate on March 1, 2008 that a goalie had more than 40 saves.

SHUTOUT
The 1-0 shutout of Colgate on Nov. 21 was both Dartmouth's and goalie Jody O'Neill's first of the season.

YOUNG ?UNS
Dartmouth boasts a very young squad this season as the Big Green has 18 underclassmen, nine sophomore and nine freshmen. Dartmouth welcomes three defensemen, two goalies and four forwards to Hanover for 2008-09.

THANKS TO THE ROOKIES
The Big Green rookies have been very important to Dartmouth's output the last two seasons. This year eight freshmen have seen action with five of them scoring at least one point.

FACING OFF
Sophomore Scott Fleming and freshman Doug Jones have been Dartmouth's key faceoff men so far this season. Fleming has won 77 of the 152 faceoffs he's taken while Jones has won 79 of the 140 he's faced. Kyle Reeds has won 50 and Connor Shields 49.

THEIR FIRSTS
Freshmen Connor Goggin and Doug Jones were the first rookies to record a point this season as the pair assisted on a goal against Vermont. Classmate Jody O'Neill got his first start in net on Oct. 31 against Harvard. Defenseman Jim Gaudet recorded his first point with an assist on the first goal of the game against Union. Goggin had his first collegiate goal against Clarkson while O'Neill had his first point against the Knights. Jones got into the goals column with his first collegiate strike against Cornell.

TOP DOG
Sophomore Adam Estoclet currently leads his team with 12 total points. Estoclet and rookie Doug Jones are tops with eight and seven assists, respectively while Joe Stejskal leads with six goals. Scott Fleming is second with five.

THE GAUDET BOYS
Head coach Bob Gaudet will have both of his sons on the roster for the next two seasons as freshman Jim joins his brother Joe, a junior. The last time a Division I head coach had both of his sons on the same collegiate roster was Bob Johnson with sons Mark and Peter at Wisconsin in 1997-78 and 1978-79.

GAUDET FROM GAUDET
Junior Joe Gaudet set up younger brother Jim with a pass from the boards on Dartmouth's first goal against Rensselaer on Nov. 8. The two brothers were given assists one and two on Scott Fleming's goal.

HOME AND AWAY
Dartmouth finished 2007-08 with a 5-6-2 record at home and was 5-10-2 on the road. Currently the Big Green is 3-2 away from home and 2-1 at home.

FIRST SCORE WINS
Dartmouth was 4-10-2 when its opponents notched the first goal of the game last year. This season the Big Green is 4-0 when scoring first and is 1-3 when the opponent lits the lamp first.

POWER SURGE
The Big Green has allowed just five power play goals this season. Currently Vermont, Union, Clarkson and Colgate have been held without an extra-man goal.

ON THE OTHER HAND
Dartmouth has notched 10 of its own power play goals. The Big Green has had more than one power play strike in two games this season.

POWER PLAYERS
Joe Stejskal has been the key man on the power play as five of his six total goals have been on the power play. He recorded two of them against Rensselaer on Nov. 8. Scott Fleming and Evan Stephens have each potted two power play strikes while Adam Estoclet had his first against Colgate.

SIN BIN
Dartmouth finished 2007-08 as the least penalized team in the nation, averaging just 10.3 penalty minutes per game. With 14.1 per game game this season, the Big Green is 46th out of 57 teams.

THIRD PERIOD TEAM
Dartmouth was a third-period team last season, scoring 44 goals in the final stanza. This season the Big Green has spread the scoring out, potting nine goals in the first period, five in the second and nine in the third with one coming in overtime.

RANKED OPPONENTS
Dartmouth is currently 2-3 against ranked opponents. Losing to then No. 20 Harvard and then No. 14/12 Vermont. The Big Green defeated St. Lawrence and Clarkson when they were both ranked Nos. 19 and 16, respectively. Recently Dartmouth dropped a game to No. 14 Cornell.

Schedules