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Ice Cats Ease to Victory

In their third game of the Marquette Invitational tournament, the Ice Cats continued their 100% start to the season, easing to a 5-0 victory against the Francis Howell Central Spartans.

The first began slow, with neither team making many decent chances on offense. The Spartan forwards were stifled early by strong defensive work by the Cats, giving senior goaltender Scott Caldwell an easy first period. The Cats opened up their account at the 6:39 mark of the first period, with junior Zach Nall sliding in a back door pass on the power play. Less than four minutes later Nall would add an assist of his own to the scoresheet, setting up sophomore Levi Wright to increase the lead to 2-0.

The second period began about as slow as the first. The Ice Cats played a very tentative game, and obvious step down from their hard fought win against Seckman the night before. Nevertheless, the Cats still found ways to increase their lead. At the 12:30 mark of the second, senior defenseman Emma Cockrum launched a beautiful stretch pass that found Wright, who smashed the puck into the bottom of the Spartan goal. After the goal, the Cats once again began playing defensively, thwarting any attack Central could muster. Even if they did play tentatively, the Spartans only had 10 shots on goal the entire game, a testament of the strong defense by the Cats. This defense was turned into numerous offensive opportunities, and the score was extended to 4-0 at the 1:14 mark of the second period. A beautiful pass from junior Jason Kelly met Wright, who finished off his hat trick with a calm effort.

By the time the third period came around, Central greatly decreased the effort they put on the puck, and so did the Cats. As was typical for the game, the Spartans barely mustered any decent chances, but the lackadaisical play from the Ice Cats failed to make many good opportunities, either. The final goal of the game would come at the 13:29 mark of the period, with senior Willie Canfield scoring an unassisted goal. This made the score 5-0, and the remainder of the game was not very eventful.