While the UNH men's hockey team managed to crawl out of the depths of not scoring during games by coming up with six goals last Saturday, they continue to struggle to earn a win on the road going into this weekend's match-ups against Northeastern and Providence.
For the past couple of games, UNH has looked to find ways to improve not only their power play, but also just putting the puck in the net. While they seemed to accomplish that, the defense could not stand up to Boston College or Lowell to maintain a UNH advantage. In the past three games, the Wildcats have allowed 20 goals, while scoring 10 themselves.
Sophomore James van Riemsdyk commented that their opponents were able to capitalize on UNH's defensive mistakes to take the game away.
"We have been good defensively," van Riemsdyk said. "But when you play against high quality competition when they get the chances, they are going to bury them and we gave them the chances and they buried them."
The road has not been friendly to UNH this year as they head for Northeastern (5-2-1 in Hockey East) tonight with a 0-4-2 road record. On the other hand, at home the Wildcats have dominated with a 4-0-1 record. UNH will return to Durham Saturday night when they play against Providence (0-6-1 in Hockey East).
"The good thing is we are going to be back home soon," UNH coach Dick Umile said. "We lost at Minnesota, we lost at BC we lost at St. Lawrence. We've lost against some good teams, we haven't played our best game in some of those games, but I don't think it has anything to do with being a team that can't play on the road."
UNH's first concern this weekend will be facing off against the top team in Hockey East in what promises to be a spectacle of a game. In UNH's last meeting with the Huskies, freshman Matt DiGirolamo made his collegiate debut and stopped 22 shots, including four in overtime. Peter LeBlanc and Paul Thompson each scored a goal for the Wildcats, but could not get enough to break the eventual tie.
As if to answer the question about if UNH is ready, captain Joe Charlebois said the team is anxious to get back out there and win their first road game this season-just as long as they keep their cool.
"We just have to not panic," Charlebois said. "We're playing fine, it's just a couple of things. One of these weekends we are going to find our breaks and it will be a battle, especially Friday night against Northeastern. It's kind of bad blood between these two teams right now, so we are going to enjoy that."
While looking to capture that first road win, the Wildcats might have to do it without Brian Foster who suffered a foot injury early in the season that kept him from playing in last weekend's games. If Foster is not healthy enough to play in tonight's game, the responsibility will once again fall to DiGirolamo. After coming off Saturday's 8-6 game, Umile said DiGirolamo was a bit unnerved, but nothing to worry about.
"He's fine," Umile said. "The important thing is that Matt knows we have confidence in him still. I know when you look at the score-but you know what, we evaluate as a team how goals are scored. Matt knows, and the team knows that we still have confidence in him."
Charlebois also talked to him after the game, and was confident that DiGirolamo would bounce back to help the team if Foster could not.
"[DiGirolamo] knew it wasn't the end of the world," Charlebois said. "We told him we would be behind him no matter what. That's the thing about goalies; they have to have a short term memory. They can't remember what happened if they get a goal scored on him. He's fine though."
UNH will then travel home on Saturday to play against the Friars.
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