Devils prospects continued to ply their trade with both the NCAA Men’s Division I Tournament plugging along towards the Frozen Four and the WHL playoffs continuing on towards the Memorial Cup.
First up today was Jeremy Davies and Northwestern taking on Cornell in the east regional at Dunkin Donuts Center in Providence. Northeastern lost this one 5-1 to get eliminated from the NCAA tournament.
Cornell got goals from Morgan Barron, Brenden Locke, Michael Regush, Beau Starrett and Mitch Vanderlaan. Northeastern’s goal was scored by Liam Pecararo with Brandon Hawkins and Davies getting the assist.
Davies’ stat line had his assist for a point, a minus-2 plus/minus rating and three shots on goal.
Northeastern’s lone goal came on the power play, making them 1-for-5 on the afternoon while Cornell was 1-for-1. In goal, Cayden Primeau made 14 saves on 19 Cornell shots. Cornell’s Austin McGrath turned aside 20 of 21 Northeastern shot attempts.
With Davies and Northeastern out of the tournament, the lone Devils hope for an NCAA national championship laid with Matt Hellickson and Notre Dame.
Unfortunately, the Fighting Irish did not have the luck and lost 4-0 as UMass advanced to the 2019 Frozen Four in Buffalo.
Massachusetts got goals from Oliver Chau, Jake Gaudet, Cale Makar and John Leonard. while goaltender Filip Lindberg stopped all 13 shots he saw.
For the Irish, Hellickson was a minus-1 plus/minus and goalie Cale Morris made 30 saves on a huge 34 shots against.
UMass converted on one of their three power plays while Notre Dame was 0-for-2.
The Minutemen will now advance out of Manchester, New Hampshire to represent the northeastern region in the 2019 Frozen Four. They will play the winner of Denver versus American International in the national semifinals. American International is a great story as they upset the number one seeded St. Cloud State in the first round. Denver – Will Butcher’s alma mater – defeated Ohio State to move on.
Moving over to the Western Hockey League where Ty Smith and the Spokane Chiefs were looking to eliminate the visiting Portland Winterhawks in game five.
And eliminate they did. The Chiefs won the series four games to one with a convincing 4-1 win in game five. Luke Toporowski and Riley Woods each had two goals for Spokane while netminder Bailey Brkin made 26 saves on 27 shots.
Portland actually took the early 1-0 lead when Cody Glass scored 4:04 into the game. But Spokane scored the next four unanswered, including Toporowski’s first, which came on the power play at 4:52 to give the Chiefs the win and the series.
Ty Smith was a minus-1 plus/minus and had a shot on goal in helping lead his team to the win.
The Winterhawks’ Joel Hofer faced 35 shots and turned aside 31 of them. The Chiefs went 1-for-2 on the power play while Portland was 0-for-4. Toporowski was the first star of the night. Woods took home the second star honors and Brikin was the third star.
Next up, the Chiefs will take on the winnters of the Victoria Royals versus Kamloops Blazers series (currently led by Victoria at three games to two) or the winners of the Everett Silvertips versus Tri-City Americans series (Everett is up three games to one in that one).
We will be back here tomorrow with coverage of the QMJHL series between Charlottetown and Cape Breton.