Tonight the Clarkson Golden Knights showed us what they are
capable of, and it was a pleasure to watch.  This was an exciting game,
with its share of comedy as well.  It will also go down in Clarkson
history because of the way in which one of the goals was scored...
     Clarkson built a 2-0 lead in the first period on goals from Conroy
and Robitaille.  They also managed to kill off four Princeton power
plays without having any themselves.  Steve Palmer did a fine job,
among others, on the penalty killing units.
    Princeton scored early in the second and the game was close for a
while.  Clarkson's lead went back to two on a shot from the point by
defenseman Brian Mueller (his 15th goal of the season!) which found
the top corner.  The goalie was evidently screened as he never even
moved and the shot, though well placed, wasn't moving very fast.  This
was a power play goal, I believe (the first PP of the game for Clarkson).
Princeton was trying to close the gap on a PP of their own in the waning
minutes of the period, when the most bizarre goal I've seen in Clarkson
hockey occurred.  With the puck in Clarkson's end, a pass to the point
eluded the defenseman (Kopeck, I think) who proceeded to chase after
it into his own end with Clarkson's Murphy hot on his tail.  Kopeck got
the puck, and kept retreating under the pressure from Murphy (back back
back, as that annoying ESPN announcer would say).  He eventually slipped
the puck between his goalie's legs, for what appeared to be (to borrow
from soccer parlance) an "own goal".  The refs had to figure out who to
give credit to, and they were talking to a couple of Clarkson players
who were pointing at Currie (evidently suggesting that he was the last
Knight to touch the puck).  Anyway, the goal was given to Murphy, even
though he appeared not to have touched the puck.  The goal was a back-
breaker for Princeton.
     The other bit of comedy in the period came when Clarkson's Lecavalier
took a Princeton player hard into the boards in front of the penalty box.
The player went head first about halfway into the penalty box.  Lecavalier
held him there for a second, then grabbed him by the seat of his pants and
tried to throw him over.  It didn't work.  Half of the crowd were laughing,
but it was probably fortunate that the ref wasn't looking.
     Early in the third period there was an announcement that Clarkson's
fourth goal had been taken away from Murphy and given to Clarkson goalie
Jason Currie.  This, to my knowledge is the first goal scored by a
Clarkson goalie (not to mention a non-empty net goal scored by a goalie!).
The announcement elicited a roar from the crowd and ensured Currie a place
in Clarkson lore.  No doubt stories of goalkeeper goals from others on the
net will be coming.  Bring them on, I'm interested to hear them.
     Tallies by Henrich (his first of the season, keeping him on pace with
Currie :-)) and Chris Lipsett in the third period closed out the scoring.
Jason also had an outstanding game in net, turning aside numerous good
chances from a tough Tiger team.
 
Princeton 0-1-1--1
Clarkson  2-2-2--6
 
On the whole, a fine effort by the whole Clarkson team and our first four-
point weekend in a long time.
 
Thanks,
-Glenn