By Stephen Sklar
Syracuse, NY— Syracuse Men’s Hockey (1-4-1) has its first road trip of the season this weekend coming off a sweep at the hands of Drexel, an unbeaten ESCHL foe. The Orange went shot-for-shot with the Dragons on Friday night but lost in overtime. Drexel won in a 7-2 route in the Saturday matinee. SU will take a long drive down to Delaware to face the Blue Hens (2-2-0) in an ESCHL clash starting Friday night.
Delaware was a perennial Top 25 team in the ACHA just a season ago, but it hasn’t found its stride just yet. The Blue Hens split both of their first two series of the season against Pittsburgh and Navy. While Delaware is still looking to put all the pieces together, Syracuse is gaining some confidence. Although SU didn’t play their best hockey last weekend, they still took Drexel to overtime and played a well-fought series against Stony Brook two weekends ago.
“We’ve seen our best hockey,” Captain Mackenzie Murphy said. “I think we played that Saturday versus Stony Brook last weekend. So, at least we have a measuring stick and we know how good this team is.”
It’s certainly something to build off of for this young team looking to gain more experience as the season progresses. This Delaware squad coming up seems to match up well with the ‘Cuse, but it’s no cakewalk. Blue Hens goalie Jacob Snellenburg always gives the team a solid chance when he's in the net. He’s made over 30 saves in each of his last two starts. His season save percentage is 92.1%. Syracuse isn’t the most outstanding goal-scoring team. Its season high in goals scored in a game is only six from two weekends ago. With Snellenburg in net, it will make it tough for the Orange to pile on goals like they did last Saturday in a one-goal loss to Stony Brook.
That just means that the SU goal scorers will have to set up big-time. Forward Jack Wren has emerged as the team’s most consistent offensive threat. Saturday night ended his stretch of three-consecutive games with a goal scored. Overall, he’s a much-improved skater and stick handler from the Kent State series.
Limit turnovers, stay out of the box, and stand tall in the defensive zone. Those are the three keys to the weekend for Syracuse. If the Dragons were able to expose a weakness in the Orange defense, other teams might also be able to.
The Orange take on Delaware at 6:15 PM on Friday night, and 5:30 PM on Saturday night. Both games will be streamed on Delaware Hockey Night (Youtube Live or dehockeynight.com) when the Orange will try and get back in the win column.
Contact me:
Twitter: @StephenASklar
Email: sasklar@syr.edu
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