The Oregon club hockey team easily handled the first two games of the Portland State series this weekend, ending their homestand with 5-3 and 9-0 wins on Friday and Saturday, respectively.
“There was definitely an improvement,” said goaltender Trevor Peterson of the second night compared to the first. “I think that PSU may not have played as well [the second night], but we also looked a lot better and a lot cleaner. We were a lot faster.”
Three seed Oregon took on six seed UCLA for the first game of the Pac-8 playoffs held in Salt Lake City, Utah. The Ducks emerged victorious with a 5-2 win over the Bruins.
The win over the Bruins means that the Ducks will be facing the No. 15 Arizona State Sun Devils, the top seed in Pool B, tomorrow night for a spot in the Pac-8 Championship, where the Ducks had fallen to Utah the year prior.
Even though it was their last two games before playoffs, the Oregon club hockey team had their focus elsewhere. For seven seniors, it would be their last home games as Oregon Ducks and, for some, their last competitive ice hockey games period. For these two nights against the College of the Canyons Cougars, the number on the board didn’t matter as much as playing with friends and playing for fans and family.
Friday night’s game—which gave the Oregon club hockey team a 2-1 lead in the series against the University of Washington—didn’t fit the typical mold of I-5 Cup games. Usually the games between the two rival hockey clubs are fast-paced, with both teams having piles of penalties along with a few points each on the board.
This game, the third game of the series, was the reverse.
After a 4-3 loss and a 6-3 win in their first games of 2014 on Friday and Saturday, the Oregon club hockey team will return to Eugene for the final two games of the heated University of Washington series. The series between the two rival teams is one of the most important of the regular season since the winning team takes home both the I-5 Cup and bragging rights until the two meet again next season.
It once again came down to the final few minutes in the Ducks’ hard-fought 4-3 victory over USC on Saturday night.
The Oregon hockey team’s momentum seemed to have finally started to turn. Hot off of a much-needed win the previous night, the Ducks looked to rob another two points from the University of Southern California. USC, on the other hand, had only lost by one the night before and looked to get the win they had been in reach of.