Clarkson vs. RPI
Houston Field House
Troy, NY
attendance 4662
officials: Murphy-Cadman-Redding
period 1
P 3:34 RPI Pothier(holding)
G 10:38 Cl (0-1) Cole(Bahen,Evans)
G 13:05 Cl (0-2) Evans(Huskins,Saper)
P 17:09 Cl Huskins (interference)
period 2
P 1:29 RPI McPherson (high stick)
G 2:07 Cl (0-3) Kuntz(Drakensjo) ppg
P 4:10 RPI Dupee (roughing)
P 6:37 Cl Kuntz (roughing)
P 18:11 RPI Munn (boarding)
P 18:48 RPI Tapper (slashing)
period 3
P 0:21 Cl Cole (hooking)
P 0:21 RPI Gardiner(roughing)
P 8:22 Cl Ellis-Toddington (interference)
P 12:20 RPI Munn (interference)
P 12:47 RPI Gardiner (slashing)
G 14:43 RPI (1-3) Murley(Caley) shg
14:56 timeout Clarkson
18:35 timeout RPI (Laing comes out)
G 19:22 Cl (1-4) Poapst eng
saves 1 2 3 t
Laing(RPI) 14 28 12 54
Mattson(Cl) 9 7 12 28
In one of their worst and stupidest played games of the season,
RPI continued their downward spiral Friday night losing to
arch-rival Clarkson by a score of 4-1 in a game that wasn't nearly as close as the score indicates. The most positive note of the game from an RPI fan's point of view occurred between the first and second periods, when, during the weekly puck shooting contest, an RPI student put the puck through a small
opening in the goal from center ice and won a 2000 Acura sedan.
It was by far the highlight of this fan's evening.
Clarkson dominated every aspect of the game with their constant forechecking, crisp passing and relentless shooting. The RPI defense left RPI goalie Joel Laing, hanging out to dry time after time, not only failing to clear the puck from the low slot but actually doing their best to screen Laing again and again.
Local boy David Evans (sophomore- Sand Lake,NY) shone tonight before his friends, family and a large contingent of Clarkson alumni as he assisted on Eric Cole's goal and then scored one of his own to give Clarkson a 2-0 lead after one.
After going up 3-0 early in the second, RPI almost got back in the game when an RPI forward, taking one of the Engineers scarce shots in the second period, beat Knight's netminder Karl
Mattson, only to have the puck hit the right post, ricochet along the goal line, bounce off the left post and get cleared by the defense. The Engineers made their own situation worse when, at 18:48 of the second and with RPI already a man down, Brad Tapper took a blatant slash at Mattson putting RPI down 5 men to 3. Although Clarkson couldn't capitalize on the power play, RPI coach Dan Fridgen was so incensed either at Tapper's stupidity or lack of sportsmanship, that Tapper was benched for the rest of the game.
The stupidity continued as the 3rd period started when Clarkson's leading scorer Eric Cole was called for hooking just 21 seconds in the period. RPI's Pete Gardiner took a swing at Cole after the play stopped and the penalty was called. Referee Murphy called Gardiner for roughing negating the RPI power play.
At 7:26 it appeared that RPI had finally gotten on the board with a goal but the referee ruled that the whistle had blown before the puck went in. The puck had never been tied up although I suspect that Murphy lost sight of it in a scramble out front. Although the play was fairly close to where I was sitting, I certainly never heard a whistle nor did several thousand other RPI fans who expressed their displeasure at the call. Nevertheless, the score remained 3-0.
More stupidity ensued when, at 12:47 with RPI's Steve Munn off for interference, Pete Gardiner took his second dumb penalty of the period when he was called for slashing, again putting RPI down 5 to 3. The following 2 minutes were played entirely in the RPI end with Clarkson peppering Laing with shot after shot. With just seconds left on the penalty, RPI's Steve Caley grabbed the puck in the high slot area and hit a breaking Matt Murley at the Calrkson blue line and Murley put one past Mattson to finally get RPI on the board. Murley's goal put some spark into RPI for the first time all evening and the Engineers started taking control. Despite a number of good chances, the Engineers just couldn't notch their second tally. Eventually,
Clarkson settled back into their game of solid forechecking and standing the RPI forwards up at their blue line and regained control of the game. Clarkson notched an empty netter to put the game away 4-1.
In just a few short weeks, RPI has gone from being solid entrenched in third place, just one game behind 2nd place Colgate and 2 games behind 1st place St. Lawrence to their
current position of still in third place, but just 1/2 game ahead of idle Cornell with Dartmouth, Clarkson and Yale
right behind them. Unless RPI turns things around, they could drop out of the top five and find themselves on the road for the first round of the playoffs.
RPI faces league leading St. Lawrence on Saturday night and closes out the regular season with a road trip to brown and Harvard next weekend.
Mark Lewin
RPI class of '69
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