There will be no penalties listed in this  posting. If you
insist on penalties being listed, trash this post and move on
to the next one.
 
On paper, everyone knew who was going to win this non-conference
game between Union and RPI. RPI was the pre-season pick to
win the ECAC while Union was picked as 11th out of 12. Just
last weekend, RPI blasted Vermont and Dartmouth by a combined
score of 14-3, while Union scored one goal while giving up 4
getting a split for the weekend. Everybody knew the outcome in
advance. Even the WRUC (Union College) hockey announcers
all but conceded the game on their Saturday night broadcast.
 
Almost everyone, that is. Someone forgot to tell Stan Moore
and his Skating Dutchmen that they had no chance. Someone forgot
to tell Leeor Shtrom, Union's second string goaltender.
 
RPI dominated this game. They were obviously better skaters. They were
obviously better passers. They were obviously better shooters. As a matter
of fact, the RPI Engineers outshot Union 50-20 on the night. The Engineers
also scored the go ahead goal at 19:40 of the 3rd period to skate away
with the Capital Skate Classic by the skin of their teeth.
 
First, let me say that I thought that the ice at the Knick was in terrible
shape. The AHL Albany River Rats play their home games at the Knick and
had their last game there Saturday night. One would have hoped that the ice
would be in better shape. It was gouged from one end to the other and looked
very soft from where I was sitting. Granted that the ice was bad equally for
both teams but when one team outskates the other and outshoots them 50-20, one
can assume that the team on the offense much of the time would get the
majority
of the crazy bounces of the puck, not to mention breakaways and two on one
plays
broken up when one of the breaking players hits a rut and goes sprawling.
 
Then there's the officiating. When RPI and Union get together, you know
there will
 be a game. Throw referree Harry Ammian into the mix and the game becomes a
circus.
The only good thing you can say about Harry is that he consistently
misinterprets
the rules of ice hockey. Enough about Harry before the powers that be on
this list
accuse me of posting with no hockey content.
 
My condolences to Union goalie Leeor Shtrom. I hope he chose Union College
to get an education rather than play hockey. I've seen this kid three times
and I feel that he could be the starting goalie on most Division I teams in
this country, Instead, he sits on the bench behind All American goalie Trevor
Koenig. It's too bad. He deserves better.
 
Union opened the scoring tonight at 11:45 of the 1st period on a goal by
Bryant
Westerman with assists from Ryan Cambell and Brent Ozarowski. The goal was
a power play goal (notice I still didn't list a penalty).
 
RPI tied the score at 5:00 of the 2nd period when Eric James scored with an
assist to Jean Francois Gosselin. When RPI went ahead 2-1 at 14:04 of the 2nd,
everyone figured that the end was in sight and that Union would just fold. The
RPI goal was scored by Alain St. Hillaire with assists from Eric Healey and
Brian Tapper.
 
Union folded all right. They folded down the ice 2 minutes later and tied the
score at 16:13. The goal was scored by Bryan Yackel with assists from Paul
Kilfoy
and Mason Anderson.
 
The 2nd period was probably the most evenly played of the night with RPI out
shooting the Dutchmen 14-12 as opposed to 20-4 in the 1st and 16-4 in the 3rd.
But Union continued to play NJ Devil style hockey, clogging up center ice and
clearing the slot. RPI greatly outshot Union, but, thanks to Shtrom and the
Union defensemen, very few of those shots were rebounds. The few rebounds
Shtrom
gave up were quickly cleared out of harm's way.
 
The third period was more of the same. RPI outshot Union 16-4 but most of
the shots
were routine and were handled nicely by Shtrom. The last 3 minutes were
played in
the RPI defensive zone and I was starting to get a really bad feeling about
the
ending that I was sure was coming. With under a minute to play, the puck
squirted
out to center. Mark Murphy picked up the puck, skated to the red line and
dumped
the puck into the corner on Shtrom's right. RPI forward Danny Riva went
streaking
into the corner and scooped the puck back to the high slot just before the
Union
defensemen made him taste plexiglass in the corner.  Jean-Francois Gosselin,
managed to untangle himself from a back checking Union defenseman, just in
time to
pick up the puck, twirl around and lift a shot over the shoulder of Leeor
Shtrom.
 
The intensity of this game made it all the more exciting. In winning, RPI
broke
the Knick jinx, never having won there before and never having even scored
a goal.
Here's hoping that the jinx is gone since the next time RPI will get a
chance to
play in the Knick is in the NCAA eastern regionals in March. (Well, maybe I'm
jumping the gun just a wee bit ;-).
 
RPI returns to the ice at Houston Field House this Saturday against
Niagara University and returns to ECAC action the following weekend with
the dreaded
North Country trip to St. lawrence and Clarkson.
 
That's it! All done. And not one penalty mentioned!!!!!
 
Mark Lewin
RPI - class of '69
 
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