Dartmouth and No. 2 Quinnipiac Meet Friday in Lake Placid

#7 Dartmouth Men's Hockey 18-15-1 11-11-0 ECAC Hockey	ECAC HOCKEY SEMIFINAL Mar. 18, 2016 \| 4:06 PM
#7 Dartmouth Men's Hockey 18-15-1 11-11-0 ECAC Hockey
Opponent	#1 Quinnipiac 27-3-7
Location	Lake Placid, N.Y.
Arena	1980 Rink - Herb Brooks Arena
All-Time Series	8-17-1
Streak	0-2-0
Last Meeting	Jan. 30, 2016 // L, 7-5 // Hanover
Television	American Sports Network (ASN)
On the Call	Eric Frede (PBP) // Colby Cohen (Color)
Video	Boxcast
Radio	99Rock WFRD
On the Call	Chris Garrett (PBP)
In-Game Twitter	@Dartmouth_MIH @QU_MIH
Notes: Dartmouth	Quinnipiac Preview / Notes
Tickets	Herb Brooks Arena Ticket Office
Information Center / Digital Press Box / Dartmouth Stats Dartmouth Schedule / Live Stats / Fan Guide

TALE OF THE TAPE
	Dartmouth	Quinnipiac
Record	18-15-1	27-3-7
Goals For	93	144
Goals Against	101	75
Assists	161	241
Points	254	385
Streak	3-0-0	1-0-0
Home	11-6-0	15-2-4
Road	7-9-1	11-1-3
Neutral	0-0-0	1-0-0
LEADERS
Goals Leader	Barre (12)	Anas (22)
Assists Leader	Barre (14)	Anas (26)
Points Leader	Barre (26)	Anas (46)
PIMs Leader	Rymsha (38)	T.Clifton/St. Denis (48)
GWG	Barre (3)	T.Clifton (5)
Wins	Grant (11)	Garteig (19)
Goals Against Average	Grant (2.47)	Garteig (1.94)
Save%	Grant (.916)	Garteig (.922)

THIS WEEKEND
The Dartmouth men's hockey team will take on No. 2-ranked and top-seeded Quinnipiac Friday afternoon at 1980 Rink – Herb Brooks Arena in Lake Placid in the 2016 ECAC Hockey Championship Semifinal.

LAST TIME OUT
The Big Green pulled the stunning sweep of No. 7 and second-seeded Yale at Ingalls Rink in New Haven in the conference quarterfinals. Despite the large disparity in shots attempted, the Big Green came away with a 4-3 overtime win in Game 1 and followed it up with an improbable 2-1 Game-2 victory thanks to the play of senior goaltender Charles Grant.

HOW WE GOT HERE
Dartmouth is 4-1 this postseason thanks to a first-round victory against Colgate that needed three games and two overtime wins at Thompson Arena. The sweep of Yale marked the first-ever postseason meeting between the two Ivy League foes in New Haven and pushed the Green and White to a 6-1 edge in the all-time postseason series.

THE FIELD
Joining Dartmouth and Quinnipiac in Lake Placid are third-seeded Harvard and fourth-seeded St. Lawrence. The Crimson and Saints will play in the 7:30 p.m. semifinal game on Friday with the winner set to take on the Dartmouth/Quinnipiac victor Saturday at 7:30 p.m. with the Whitelaw Cup and NCAA Tournament automatic berth on the line.

The field for Lake Placid is now set. #ECACHockey pic.twitter.com/YJ8HQyJguJ
— Dartmouth Hockey (@Dartmouth_MIH) March 13, 2016

SCOUTING QUINNIPIAC
The Bobcats have been the No. 1 team in the nation for the better part of three months now as they have just three losses all season, coming into the weekend with a 27-3-7 mark in 2015-16. However, North Dakota jumped into the No. 1 spot this weekend with the Bobcats falling back one spot to second. Quinnipiac nearly ran the table in league play this season with its lone regular season loss to a conference opponent coming at St. Lawrence in overtime on Feb. 12. The Bobcats claimed their third regular season title in four years with a 16-1-5 mark in ECAC Hockey games, while the first loss of the season didn't come until a Dec. 12 game vs. BU, snapping their 15-0-2 start to the year.

AGAINST THE 'CATS
Dartmouth dropped both games against QU this season.
- The first game came in Hamden on Nov. 14 with the Bobcats taking a 6-2 win thanks to two power-play goals on a major penalty assessed to Brett Patterson at the end of the second period. Charles Grant made 33 saves in the game, while Carl Hesler and Corey Kalk scored Dartmouth's two goals.
- The second was a wild affair in Hanover on Jan. 29 in which the Bobcats erased a 5-2 third-period deficit to win 7-5. The heartbreaking loss snapped Dartmouth's five-game win streak. Hesler scored his second of the season against the Bobcats with Jack Barre netting a pair in the second. Freshman John Ernsting's goal 53 seconds into the third period was the first of his career, while Brett Patterson notched his eighth of the year at 5:19 of the frame for the final goal from the home team. Sam Anas — the conference's leading point producer – scored twice in the third and finished with three points in the comeback win.

POSTSEASON VS. THE BOBCATS
These two teams have played just once before in postseason play, a 2010 first-round series in Hamden. Sixth-seeded Quinnipiac won the opener, 3-2, before 10th-seeded Dartmouth claimed a 6-3 win in Game 2. Ben Ketchum's only goal of the season just 1:57 into the second period of Game 3 proved to be the winner as the Bobcats advanced with a 2-1 triumph.

Year	Round	Record	Results
2010	First Round	2-1	Game 1: L, 3-2
	No. 10 Dartmouth at No. 7 Quinnipiac		Game 2: W, 6-3
			Game 3: L, 2-1

CHAMPIONSHIP WEEKEND
This is the first time reaching the league's final four since 2011 for the Big Green. Dartmouth fell, 3-0, to Cornell in a semifinal match-up, while taking down Colgate, 5-3, in the now-canceled Consolation Game. The league championship was held at Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City that season.

SEMIFINAL HISTORY
This year marks the eighth time Dartmouth has reached the semifinals. The team is just 2-6 in those previous contests, with just the 2001 game against St. Lawrence coming in Lake Placid.

OVERTIME AGAIN!
With Game 1 going to overtime at Yale, Dartmouth has now played three OT contests in their five total games so far in this postseason. Prior to this season, the Green had never gone to multiple overtimes in a single series and never more than two in an entire postseason. Both figures are now gone as it won two OT games against Colgate in the first round and another against the Elis for a new program record.

THE REASON
Dartmouth advanced to this year's semifinal thanks in large part to the play of its senior netminder. Grant turned in the top-two save performances of his career in the sweep of Yale, stopping 48 shots in the overtime victory in Game 1, while standing on his head to make 46 in regulation to steal the win and clinch the series in Game 2.

ANOTHER AWARD
For his play at Yale, Grant was named the ECAC Hockey Goaltender of the Week for the third time in 2015-16. For his career, Grant has now earned the league's top netminder accolade five times. For his efforts, Grant was also named the American Sports Network Player of the Week and the College Hockey News Warrior Hockey National Player of the Week.

For the 3rd time in 2016, Charles Grant is your #ECACHockey Goaltender of the Week. https://t.co/PC6slNVPrw pic.twitter.com/vu40PMswgP
— Dartmouth Hockey (@Dartmouth_MIH) March 16, 2016

BLOCKS… A TON OF BLOCKS
Dartmouth blocked 47 shots last weekend, fourth most in the nation over the course of the weekend. But the three teams ahead of Dartmouth (Robert Morris/59, Cornell/50 and Quinnipiac/48) as well as the two teams behind (Lake Superior/47 and Bentley/46) all needed three games to reach their numbers. The Big Green's 23.50 blocks per game was the most in the nation, two more than Denver (21.50), who swept Nebraska-Omaha. Josh Hartley led the entire nation with nine blocks this weekend.

TAKE A BOW, YAU!
Connor Yau's fourth goal of the season might prove to be the biggest of the season for the Big Green when things are all said and done. The freshman finished off a great passing play down low from Tim O'Brien and Alex Jasiek at 17:14 of overtime to give the Green the opening game. The marker was the first game-winner in the Algonquin, Illinois, native's career.

UNLIKELY SCORERS
Dartmouth scored six goals against the top goalie in the nation in Yale's Alex Lyon. Of those six goals, four came from players with less than five career goals to their credit: Tim Shoup (2), Kevan Kilistoff (3), River Rymsha (2) and Connor Yau (4). Nick Bligh's two third-period goals in Game 1 made him the only player with more than five tallies to beat Lyon on the weekend.

RARE ROAD SERIES WIN
Dartmouth's win at Yale was rare. How rare? The Big Green only have three road series wins in 11 match-ups in program history. However, each of those series victories away from Hanover have come in the last five seasons: a sweep of St. Lawrence in the 2012 first round and a three-game victory at Rensselaer in 2014.

ONLY ROAD WIN OF 2016
The triumph in New Haven is the only series win by a road team in this season's conference tournament. Home teams are 7-1 this year in terms of series victories with Yale's loss to Dartmouth standing as the lone defeat.

NEUTRAL-SITE GAMES
The Big Green have yet to play a neutral-site game this season. Dartmouth also didn't play a neutral-site game in 2014-15 either. It did play three such games in 2013-14, going 0-3-0 between games at the Prudential Center in Newark (Brown and Princeton) and the Verizon Wireless Arena in Manchester (UNH).

SENIOR-LADEN TEAM
The 10-members of the class of 2016 are tied with Miami for the largest by any senior group in the nation this season. With the Redhawks' season done, the Big Green now have the largest remaining class of seniors still playing.

50 AGAINST
The Bulldogs had 51 shots on goal Friday night, making them the first team since Union on Jan. 31, 2009 to eclipse the mark in a game against the Green. They nearly reached it again the following night as the Elis held a 47-15 shots on goal advantage. For the weekend, Yale out-attempted Dartmouth, 207-97, but managed just four goals.

AGAINST A 1-SEED
Coming into the weekend, Dartmouth is just 1-4 all-time against a team seeded first in the ECAC Hockey postseason. However, the Big Green are 1-0 against a No. 1 seed in the semifinals, taking down Boston University, 5-3, in the 1979 semifinal at Boston Garden. The last time Dartmouth played a team ranked first was in 2014 when Union swept a quarterfinals series in Schenectady en route to a conference title and an NCAA National Championship.

A SURPRISING RUN
Dartmouth has never reached the championship weekend seeded lower than fifth in the postseason tournament. This run to Lake Placid as the seven-seed marks the program's most improbable run ever to the final-four grouping.

OLYMPIC ICE
This weekend marks just the second time this season that the Green and White will play on an Olympic-sized sheet of ice. Dartmouth dropped a 6-3 game at UNH's Whittemore Center in December to close out the first half of the year.

FOLLOW ALONG!
Those looking to follow all the action in Lake Placid this weekend have several options.
● Video: All three games will be carried live on ECACHockey.com through the technology of Boxcast for $9.95 per game. Subscribers of the Ivy League Digital Network will not have access to these games and must purchase ECAC Hockey's per-game streaming service to view postseason action at 1980 Rink — Herb Brooks Arena. Eric Frede will handle play-by-play duties with former national champion from Boston University (2009) Colby Cohen adding color.
● Audio: Chris Garrett will handle play-by-play duties with both games broadcast on 99Rock WFRD (99.3FM).
● Live Stats: DartmouthSports.com will provide live stats for those looking to track the game's play-by-play.
● Twitter: Fans are encouraged to follow the team's official Twitter account for in-game updates and insights: @Dartmouth_MIH.

WHAT'S AHEAD?
A win on Friday and Dartmouth will play for the ECAC Hockey Championship and the Whitelaw Cup on Saturday. A loss ends the Big Green's season as their Pairwise Ranking is not high enough to earn an at-large berth into the NCAA Tournament.

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