In front of over 200 raucous fans, the men’s club ice hockey team defeated Clemson, 4-2, on Saturday night at the RecZone.
Although the Tigers were fresh off a thorough beating of Georgia, 9-2, the night before at home, Wes White said the team did not look fatigued in the least.
“I think with them having two games underneath their belts, it gave them a bit of an advantage,” White said. “For our first game, I thought the guys started fairly well.”
Last year’s Atlantic Coast Conference Hockey League player of the year, Dan Masiulis, did not disappoint in his team’s opener. The junior in education scored two goals, including one off a stunning short-handed breakaway that turned out to be the game winner.
“I kept thinking, ‘I have to score,’ If I missed, it would have been awful. My self-esteem would have gone down a lot.”
Head coach David Kurtz, who served as an assistant coach during last year’s campaign, said the team is focused on surrounding Masiulis, a junior, with young talent.
“He’s really good, but we’ve got to give him better support,” Kurtz said. “We can’t rely on him to give us a hat trick every night, although that would be nice.”
Junior Ben Dombrowski scored the Pack’s other two goals. Eric Michelich, an undeclared freshman, tallied two assists in his first game with the Wolfpack.
Masiulis and co-captain Wes White said they were also very impressed with the performance of Nick Christopoulos, a freshman in civil engineering.
“Nick really impressed us on the penalty kill,” White said. “He’s a grinder-style player, and he’s not afraid to get down and dirty.”
Goaltender Stephen Russell turned away 27 shots in three periods for the Pack. The crowd roared when, during the second period, Russell snatched a point-blank shot out of mid-air while sprawled out on the ice in butterfly position.
“Steven played great and had some big saves, Kurtz said. “One nice thing about our team is we have two goalies who I feel we can put out there in any game.”
Anthony Sandonato, who normally plays on State’s top line with Masiulis and Michelich, was out of town for family reasons. Jonathan Hires, a sophomore in mechanical engineering, took Sandonato’s place, and had his shot on the power play tipped by Masiulis for the latter’s first goal.
“That goal should have been Hires’, but Masiulis stole it from him,” Kurtz said.
State often double-shifted its top two lines, and that appeared to wear on the team as the game went on. At one point, State led 4-1, but Clemson crawled back into the game during the third period.
“During the first period, we looked like we had a bunch of people who are new, and we do,” Kurtz said. “The second period was our best, and the third we got a little lazy. Clemson looked like they’d thrown in the towel, but they got that one goal and they really played us hard for the rest of the game.”
State faces Virginia next Saturday at 9:30 at the RecZone before traveling to Hershey, Pa., to participate in a tournament with teams from around the country. Masiulis said the team would love to have the fan support they had in their home opener.
“We were all really pleased with the turnout,” Masiulis said. “The fans really inspired us, and we were able to pull out a win.”
