MIDDLEBURY, Vt. – The No. 2/5 nationally-ranked Norwich University men's ice hockey team picked up its most convincing win of the season with an impressive 5-1 victory over No. 3 ranked Plattsburgh State on the opening day of the 2014 PrimeLink Great Northern ShootOut.
Sophomore forward Austin Surowiec (Louisville, Ky.) scored twice, while senior defenseman Bryce Currier (Essex Junction, Vt.) notched three assists and freshman goalie Braeden Ostepchuk (Lethbridge, Alberta) made 22 saves to lead the Cadets to the victory in the battle of unbeaten teams coming into the game.
After a scoreless first period, Norwich (7-0-0, 5-0-0 ECAC East) came alive in the second period, scoring three times to build up a lead it would never look back from.
Surowiec broke the deadlock at the 5:44 mark when he beat Plattsburgh goalie Brady Rouleau with a quick wrist shot over the glove to the far post off an assist from Justin Charbonneau (Bromont, Quebec) to make it 1-0 Norwich.
Norwich extended the lead to 2-0 at the 11:41 mark of the second period when sophomore William Pelletier (St. Jean Chrysostome, Quebec) beat Rouleau from the same spot Surowiec did at the top of the left faceoff circle for his first goal of the season. Pelletier made his season debut on Friday night after he missed the previous six games with an injury.
Pelletier snapped a wrist shot over the blocker of Rouleau off the crossbar and into the back of the net off assists from Alec Thieda (Rochester Hills, Mich.) and Currier.
Charbonneau made it 3-0 less than three minutes later when he finished off a well-executed 3-on-2 rush for his first goal of the season. Currier started the breakout with a pass to Baldillez on the right wing. Baldillez carried the puck with speed into the zone on and fed a pass over to a crashing Charbonneau who chipped the puck into the let leaving Rouleau no chance to get to the other post.
Norwich carried the intensity into the third period, scoring two more times in the opening 4:18 of the period to take a 5-0 lead on the Cardinals.
Sophomore Brendan Boyce (St. Albans, Vt.) notched his third goal of the season on his backhand with a Plattsburgh defender draped all over him to increase the lead to 4-0 at the 3:38 mark. Boyce took a drop pass from Dean Niezgoda (Brewster, Mass.) and slid the puck through Rouleau's five-hole while falling to the ice.
Surowiec capped Norwich's scoring just 30 seconds later when he one-timed a shot into the bottom left corner of the net on the power play off a pretty passing set up from Currier and Thieda to make it 5-0 Norwich.
Plattsburgh broke up Ostepchuk's shutout bid at the 12:07 mark of the third period with a pretty tip-in goal by Anthony Calabrese off an initial shot from the blue line by Connor Toomey.
Ostepchuk improved to 4-0-0 on the season while Rouleau suffered his first loss to fall to 3-1. Rouleau made 24 saves before being pulled after the fifth Norwich goal. Ryan Hubbard came on for the final 15:42 and made five saves for Plattsburgh.
Norwich will look to win its record ninth PrimeLink Great Northern ShootOut title on Saturday when it will play the winner of Middlebury/Concordia (Minn.) at 7 p.m. in the PrimeLink ShootOut Championship game. The Cadets improved to 21-9-3 all-time at the PrimeLink, which is the best record out of the host school trio.
Norwich also improved to 27-20-2 all-time against Plattsburgh State, avenging last season's 4-2 loss at Kreitzberg Arena.
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