No Terry No Problem: Pioneers score seven in rout of Broncos

The No. 1 ranked Denver Pioneers were ready for revenge during round two with the No. 14 Western Michigan Broncos. The Pioneer offense exploded for seven goals en route to defeating the Broncos 7-2, despite being without the American hero Troy Terry due to an upper-body injury.

“I thought it was a statement game by our players in the dressing room.” Head coach Jim Montgomery said after the game.

Last night’s matchup saw a Denver team in which had a multitude of scoring chances, including going 0-for-3 on the power play, but couldn’t capitalize on any of them, on this night their fortunes would change.

“When we breakdown the [previous] game our chances were 26 to 14 for us,” head coach Jim Montgomery said before the game. “So we had more quality chances than they did. But a big part of the game is special teams and we didn’t win that battle last night.”

The Pioneers scored on their first two power play opportunities and were able to go 3-for-8 on the power play in the game. That would be the difference again tonight.

DU got the power play cooking early in this one. Matt Marcinew picked up the first power play goal for the Pios just four minutes into the hockey game on a rebound from Dylan Gambrell’s wrister. The second goal also came on the power play courtesy of Jarid Lukosevicius with Will Butcher and Gambrell picking up the helpers on both of the goals. That gave the Pioneers a two goal lead heading into the first intermission.

The Broncos were able to cut DU’s lead in half early in the first period with a goal from Philadelphia Flyers prospect Wade Allison. If WMU was able to garner any momentum from that, it didn’t last very long. The Pioneers would be able to answer with three unanswered goals in the second period.

The first one would come from a Colin Staub snipe from the right face-off circle. The next one was a tip-in from Evan Ritt in which was Ritt’s first goal of the season, with Will Butcher and Logan O’Connor picking up the assist and then O’Connor was able to get a short-handed goal for himself to give the Pioneers a 5-1 lead, his second short-handed goal of the season.

Usually with the Pioneers it’s the big three, Gambrell, Terry, and Henrik Borgstrom, who have to provide the offense but tonight they were able to get contributions from everyone.

“Everyone played great tonight,” coach Montgomery said after the game. “There were no passengers tonight.”

In the third period, the floodgates stayed open. Emil Romig would get the sixth goal off of a pass from Adam Plant. Then the power play scored their third goal of the night as Kevin Conley would pick-up his third goal of the season. Western Michigan would get themselves a consolation goal courtesy of Minnesota Wild prospect Matheson Iacopelli.

That would do it for the scoring in the hockey game as the Pioneers grab themselves a bounce back 7-2 victory.

THREE STARS:

First star: Will Butcher (Denver)
Second star: Logan O’Connor (Denver)
Third star: Evan Ritt (Denver)

BY THE NUMBERS:

TURNING POINT OF THE GAME:

Will Butcher/Evan Ritt’s goal in the second period. The goal would put the Pioneers up 3-1 after Western Michigan had just recently made it 2-1.

WHAT’S NEXT:

The Pioneers will have a week of practice before they make the trip to St. Cloud, Minnesota for a weekend series against the Huskies.