Final Road Trip of Regular Season Sends Dartmouth to the North Country

Friday, February 21

Canton, N.Y.

7 PM

Dartmouth College

St. Lawrence

Matt Baker vs. St. Lawrence last month

Photo by: Doug Austin

Final Road Trip of Regular Season Sends Dartmouth to the North Country

2/20/2020 10:03:00 AM | Men's Ice Hockey

Big Green take on St. Lawrence and No. 5 Clarkson

By: Pat Salvas

GAME 26
Dartmouth | 11-10-4, 8-8-2 ECAC
St. Lawrence | 3-23-4, 1-16-1 ECAC
Date: Friday, 2.21.20 — 7 p.m.
Location: Appleton Arena | Canton, N.Y.
Watch: ESPN+ | International Feed
Listen: DartmouthSports.com | Rob Kennedy (PxP)
Follow Along: Live Stats

GAME 27
Dartmouth | 11-10-4, 8-8-2 ECAC
No. 5 Clarkson | 22-6-2, 15-3-0 ECAC
Date: Saturday, 2.22.20 — 7 p.m.
Location: Cheel Arena | Potsdam, N.Y.
Watch: ESPN+ | International Feed
Listen: DartmouthSports.com | Rob Kennedy (PxP)
Follow Along: Live Stats

Game Notes

THIS WEEKEND
• The Dartmouth men’s hockey team heads to the North Country to take on St. Lawrence and No. 5 Clarkson this weekend.
• This marks the final road trip of the regular season for the Big Green as the playoffs begin in two weeks with just a home series against Union and RPI on the docket after this.

LAST TIME OUT
• Dartmouth split a home weekend with Brown (5-2) and Yale (3-4).
• The Big Green dominated play, but needed two late goals in the third period to give themselves some breathing room in the victory against the Bears.
• Dartmouth held Brown to just 13 shots on goal in 60 minutes with eight of those coming in the final period.
• Five different players scored goals in the game with Collin Rutherford (1-1-2), Matt Baker (0-2-2), Quin Foreman (0-2-2) and Will Graber (0-2-2) all recording multi-point efforts.
• The following night saw the home team take leads of 1-0 and 2-1 only to have the Bulldogs bounce back and earn a 4-2 edge in the third period. Graber scored his second of the night with 54 seconds left and the Big Green had several chances in the final minute to tie it that missed the mark.

THIS WEEK’S OPPONENTS…
• St. Lawrence is at the bottom of the ECAC Hockey standings with a 1-16-1 mark in league play and are just 3-23-4 overall. That means little to a Dartmouth team that is always in for a battle against SLU in Canton.
• Zach Risteau leads the team in both points and assists and is second in goals, but of his 7-15-22 scoring line, just one goal and two assists have come in home games. And only three points have come since the start of the second half of the season in Hanover at the Ledyard Classic.
• The Saints were 2-14-1 before last year’s meeting at Appleton and, on paper, it appeared to be an easy win for the visitors. However, the teams played to a 2-2 tie with St. Lawrence’s Ryan Garvey tying the game in the third period.
• Clarkson is 22-6-2 overall and 15-3-0 in ECAC Hockey games. The Golden Knights have not only proven themselves to be one of the top teams in ECAC Hockey this year, but — as demonstrated by their No. 5 ranking in the latest USCHO national poll — also as one of the best in the country.
• The team poses a formidable scoring punch at the top of the lineup with Haralds Egle leading the way with 30 points.
• Five players have at least 20 points this season and give Clarkson one of the top scoring offenses in the league (2.93).
• The offense is good, but the team defense (1.73) is even better. The anchor of that group is senior Frank Marotte (a former Robert Morris goalie), and his impressive 1.66 goals against average and .941 save percentage, both of which lead all ECAC Hockey netminders this season along with his 22 wins and three shutouts.
• SLU Leaders:
o Points | Haralds Egle (30)
o Goals | Josh Dunne (13)
o Assists | Devin Brosseau (19)
o Goaltending | Frank Marotte: 22-6-2, 1.66, .941
• Clarkson Leaders:
o Points | Zach Risteau (22)
o Goals | Keenan Suthers (8)
o Assists | Zach Risteau (15)
o Goaltending | Daniel Mannella: 2-9-2, 2.94, .911

AGAINST THESE TEAMS
• This season, Dartmouth had to work for a 3-1 home win in January as the Saints took an early lead just 84 seconds into the game. Cam Strong, Will Graber and Drew O’Connor all scored in the contest, while holding the Saints to just 15 shots on goal, the previous season low for an opponent prior to Brown.
• In the earlier game between the Big Green and Clarkson in Hanover, freshman Tyler Campbell scored the game winner with just 2:42 left in regulation to give Dartmouth the 3-2 victory against the No. 7 team in the nation. Graber and Collin Rutherford also scored in the game, while Adrian Clark stopped 28 between the pipes

THE BOYS ARE BACK TOGETHER
• The coaching staff reassembled the top line of Drew O’Connor, Will Graber and Quin Foreman for the Brown/Yale weekend and the trio appeared not to have missed a beat.
• Graber (2-2-4), Foreman (0-3-3) and O’Connor (2-0-2) combined to score four goals and dish out five assists between them in the three games.
• Graber had been moved back on defense since early January in the extra skater position, but immediately clicked when once again moved up to the top line’s center.
• Drew O’Connor scored his 14th goal of the season against Brown in the final three minutes of the game and then netted another the following night against Yale to bring his current total to 15, the second-best mark in ECAC Hockey this season.
• Quin Foreman had a pair of helpers against Brown and then another against Yale.

GRABER’S GAINS
• Graber played nine games on defense and in that time, tied for the team lead in scoring with nine points (3-6-9).
• His 17 blocks were the most of any Dartmouth player in that stretch as well.
• In 117 career games, Graber now has 89 points on 33 goals and 56 assists, the active Dartmouth leader in each.

OC AT HOME
• O’Connor is second in the league in total goals this season, behind only Harvard’s Jack Drury (16).
• But no player has scored more goals in home games this season than O’Connor’s 10 after adding two this past weekend.
• Yale’s Curtis Hall had been the leader with nine, but was passed on Saturday when O’Connor’s second-period power-play tally found the back of the net.
• Nationally, O’Connor trails only Minnesota’s Scott Reedy (11) in tallies on home ice in 2019-20.
• Graber is the next closest Dartmouth player with six scores at Thompson Arena this year.

QUIN’ING
• Foreman sits just outside the top-10 in scoring this season amongst ECAC players with 24 points (10-14-24).
• The junior is just nine points back of his career high of 28 set last season in nine more games than he has played this year.

IVY PLAY
• With Ivy League play behind them now, the Big Green had several strong performances in their 10 games against “conference opponents.”
• As it stands now, Drew O’Connor (7-7-14) is tied with Harvard’s Nick Abruzzese (6-8-14) for the lead in scoring with 14 points each. Impressively enough, 11 of the 14 points for O’Connor came at even strength.
• His seven goals ae the most in the Ivy League, with Will Graber’s six tied for second.
• Quin Foreman leads with 10 helpers in 10 games and his 12 points are tied for third. Graber’s 10 (6-4-10) points are fifth.
• Graber and O’Connor are tied for the league lead with two game-winners.
• Tanner Palocsik is seventh in defenseman scoring with six points (2-4-6) and fifth amongst all freshmen.
• Dartmouth’s penalty kill operated at 84.8% in those 10 games, the best mark of any of the six schools.

STREAKS!
• Quin Foreman’s current six-game point streak (4-4-8) is the longest of his career and the longest of any Dartmouth player this season.
• Matt Baker is currently on a five-game run of points (0-7-7), the second longest of his career after a six-game stretch as a freshman (4-4-8).
• Collin Rutherford is the only other Big Green skater to have a streak beyond last weekend as his three-game span (1-3-4) started against Harvard the week before.

MATTY BAKES
• Speaking of Matt Baker, his first-period assist against Brown on Daniel Warpecha’s goal was the 50th point of his career.
• He would go on to add another in the game and one more versus Yale to give him 52 (19-33-52) in 90 games played.

STRONG’S STRONG STARTS
• Cam Strong likes playing first periods.
• There is no other explanation for the fact that all five of the senior’s goals this season have come in the opening frame of play.
• No other Dartmouth player has scored more in the first 20 minutes of play than Strong, who got the scoring started with a redirection off his chest and into the net just six minutes into the game against Brown.
• O’Connor’s six second-period goals are the most of any Dartmouth player in one period this season, but O’Connor has managed to also score four in first periods, four in thirds and once in overtime.

DANNY WARPS
• Daniel Warpecha scored three goals in the first four games of the season.
• He then scored against Northeastern in the final game of the first half of the season.
• It would be 11 outings before the senior found the back of the net again, doing so against Harvard.
• Warpecha notched another against the Bears for a pair of goals in as many games for the second time this season.
• The most recent goal was his sixth of the year, tying his career high set as a freshman in 2016-17.

CLIFF!
• Harrison Markell’s first assist of the season came on the Cam Strong goal against Brown.
• It was the first point for Markell since notching his first career goal in the season opener at Harvard back on Nov. 1.
• Markell had five assists as a freshman (0-5-5) in 2018-19.

BLOCK PARTY
• Dartmouth has 360 total blocks as a team this season, good for sixth in the league.
• When put into a per-game average (helpful for Ivy teams who have played roughly five fewer contests than their non-Ivy ECAC Hockey counterparts), Dartmouth is second with 1.40 per game, tied with Harvard and behind only Union (14.67).
• On a national level, the Big Green’s 14.40 average ranks ninth. Robert Morris leads the way with 16.80 per game.

WHAT’S HAPPENING?
• With just two weekends left in league play, only five points separate fourth-place Harvard (23) and seventh-place Dartmouth/Yale (18).
• Clarkson and Cornell are tied atop the standings with 30 points each, while Quinnipiac (24) has just a one-point edge on the Crimson.
• Colgate and RPI are tied for fifth with 19 points, just one ahead of the Big Green and Bulldogs on their heels.
• Brown is ninth with 14 points, while Union has 11 points in 10th. Any point by the group of four in the middle of the pack would automatically cause the Dutchmen to go on the road in the first round.
• Princeton (7) and St. Lawrence (3) know they will be on the road in the postseason’s first-round.

UNDERWATER BUT ABOVE .500
• Dartmouth is one of just four teams this season with a winning percentage of .500 or better while having allowed more goals than scored.
• The Big Green are a -9 this season (75-84).
• UNH (.533, -4), Alaska (.516, -10) and Notre Dame (.500, -3) are the other three teams to have earned this dubious distinction so far.

ESPN+
• All of Dartmouth home games will be carried this season on ESPN+ with Tyler Murray providing play-by-play throughout the home schedule in 2019-20.
• In addition to games played in Hanover, ECAC Hockey road games at each school besides Rensselaer will also be carried on the network, making ESPN+ your home for 21-of-22 conference games and 26 regular season games total.
• Postseason games will also be carried on ESPN+ in 2019-20 and will not need subscribers to pay any additional fees to watch the league’s postseason.

ON THE AIR
• Once again, Rob Kennedy will be the Voice of the Big Green on the radio.
• Kennedy is in his third season with the team and will broadcast all 29 regular season games via an audio link through DartmouthSports.com.

WHAT’S AHEAD?
• The Big Green will close out the regular season next weekend at home against Union and RPI, two teams that defeated them just three weeks ago in the Albany Region.
• Saturday night’s game against the Engineers will serve as Senior Day for the nine-member Class of 2020 playing in the final regular season home game of their career.

Playoff Scenarios

Playoff picture with 4 games remaining as calculated by PlayoffStatus.com

^ means the team will finish better than this playoff spot
X means the team cannot win this playoff spot
50% - probability the team will win this playoff spot - green number indicates the team controls its destiny for this spot
* denotes first round bye in the post season conference tournament
** denotes first round home field advantage in the post season conference tournament

Team	W	L	T	Pts	1*	2*	3*	4*	5**	6**	7**	8**	9	10	11	12
Cornell	14	2	2	30	70%	30%	<1%	<1%	^	^	^	^	^	^	^	^
Clarkson	15	3	0	30	30%	68%	1%	<1%	^	^	^	^	^	^	^	^
Quinnipiac	11	5	2	24	<1%	1%	74%	24%	1%	<1%	<1%	<1%	^	^	^	^
Harvard	9	4	5	23	X	1%	24%	64%	8%	2%	<1%	<1%	^	^	^	^
Rensselaer	9	8	1	19	X	X	1%	6%	26%	23%	27%	18%	1%	<1%	^	^
Colgate	8	7	3	19	X	X	<1%	4%	28%	30%	20%	18%	1%	^	^	^
Dartmouth	8	8	2	18	X	X	<1%	1%	29%	28%	27%	14%	<1%	<1%	^	^
Yale	8	8	2	18	X	X	<1%	<1%	8%	17%	25%	45%	4%	<1%	^	^
Brown	6	10	2	14	X	X	X	X	<1%	<1%	1%	5%	81%	14%	<1%	^
Union	5	12	1	11	X	X	X	X	X	X	<1%	<1%	13%	79%	8%	<1%
Princeton	2	13	3	7	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	1%	7%	91%	<1%
St. Lawrence	1	16	1	3	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	X	<1%	<1%	>99%