Bentley Takes on Holy Cross in Home and Home Series to Close out Regular Season
Game Notes
THE MATCHUP: The Atlantic Hockey regular season comes to a close this weekend and Bentley will take on rival Holy Cross in a home and home series. Friday's game takes place at Bentley Arena and will be Senior Night. The series then shifts to Worcester for the second game on Saturday night. Both games get underway at 7:05 pm.
Prior to Friday's game, Bentley's senior class of Ethan Roswell, Luke Orysiuk, Will Schlagenhauf, Fraser Kirk, Dylan Pitera and Brendan Walkom will be honored.
Bentley comes into the weekend in 7th place in the AHA standings with 33 points. That has them just one point out of earning a first round bye. Holy Cross enters the weekend in 10th with 24 points.
This will be the second series of the season between the two teams. They split a home and home series back on Oct. 21 & 23. Each team won on the other's home-ice. Bentley won in Worcester 4-2 and Holy Cross won in Waltham 3-2.
FOLLOW THE GAMES: Both games can be seen live on FloHockey.TV. A subscription is required.
Live stats for each game can be found at https://bentleyfalcons.com/sports/mice/2021-22/schedule
Tickets for the games this weekend can be purchased at the following link: https://www.etix.com/ticket/v/12892/the-bentley-arena
If you are planning to attend, please note Bentley University's spectator policy: https://bentleyfalcons.com/information/Spectators_Policy
POSTSEASON PICTURE: The top six teams in the standings at the end of the regular season earn a bye to the quarterfinals, and the top-four earn home-ice for that round. The teams that finish 7th-10th will play a first round, best-of-three series next weekend.
Bentley is just one point out of the top six and five points out of the top-four.
AIC and Canisius have both already clinched home-ice for the quarterfinals and Army has clinched at least a bye. RIT is currently in 4th place with 38 points and they have a three point lead on Sacred Heart in 5th place. Air Force occupies 6th place with 34 points with Bentley right behind them with 33 points.
LAST TIME OUT: Bentley dropped the first game of last weekend's series to Air Force 4-1. The Falcons though won a shootout on Saturday to earn two points after the game ended in a 4-4 tie. Bentley battled back from 4-2 down and the comeback started with a goal by freshman Harrison Scott at 16:15 of the 2nd period. Grad student Brendan Hamblet then tied the game late in the 3rd period with his 3rd goal of the season at the 17:30 mark.
Neither team scored in the 3-on-3 overtime to send the game to a shootout. Both teams scored in the first round of the shootout; Will Gavin for Air Force and Matt Gosiewski for Bentley. Both goalies made saves in the 2nd and 3rd rounds. Bentley's Nicholas Grabko denied Willie Reim in the 4th round to setup Lucas Vanroboys with a chance to win it. Vanroboys did just that with a shot over the glove of Air Force goalie Alex Schilling.
TEAM NOTES: Senior defenseman Ethan Roswell ranks 4th nationally in blocks with 73.
Sophomore Cole Kodsi has 17 more points in his sophomore year than he did as a freshman. He had two points as a freshman, and has 19 this season (7g, 12a) and is the team's 3rd leading scorer.
Grad student forward Brendan Hamblet has played in 146 career games, which is tied for 3rd most in program history. The record is 153, held by Kyle Schmidt, Class of 2018.
Sophomore defenseman Drew Bavaro leads Bentley in each of goals (9), assists (15) and points (24). He ranks T-12th nationally in points among defensemen and T-7th in Atlantic Hockey overall. His 9 goals are T-8th nationally among defensemen and T-8th in the AHA overall. And his 15 assists are T-5th in the AHA.
Grad student defenseman Matt Lombardozzi has 7 power play goals on the season. That is 2nd most in the AHA and T-10th nationally.