Photo: 39 Ben Chase celebrates the first and only goal for ASU
It was a full house at the Findlay Toyota Center to enjoy ice hockey once again. This time it was to see the Grand Canyon University Antelopes nip the Arizona State Sun Devils 2-1.
This is the second year that GCU has played in Prescott Valley. Last year the Lopes beat the University of Arizona 4-3.
Photo:19 Caden Hendrickson is about to attempt a shot past 15 Ty Merchant
In this latest game, all of the scoring took place in the second period as the two teams battled with a lot of hard hits on their opponents throughout the contest.
Photo: 30 Dmytro Kubrytskyi fends off another shot by the Sun Devils 93 Hunter Friesen as 7 Tyler Misialek stands between him and his goalie
Lopes goalie Dmytro Kubrytskyi came into the game with a 1.77 goals against average and was solid again in the net and nearly perfect on the night with 26 saves, but one goal did sneak by him early in the second period. Sun Devil’s goaltender Nate Glenn was nearly as impressive, allowing just two goal with 22 saves.
The Sun Devils struck first in the opening minute of the second period when Ben Chase put the puck into the left corner of the net and it was 1-0.
Photo: 2 Gabe Tritschler is headed for a fall in the opening period with a little help from 93 Hunter Friesen
The Lopes tied the score at the eight plus minutes later on a slap shot by sophomore forward Tyler Misialek, his third goal on the season.
GCU took the lead with six and half minutes left in the second period when forward Benjamin Oakland went around from behind the net while Glenn went way out of the net area to try and clear the puck. Oakland got to the puck and spun around to score as Glenn tried to recover back into position, but was too late.
Photo: Arizona States #89 drives with the puck against 83 Caden Surchik
The third period was intense as both teams remained very physical but unable to score. ASU pressured the Lopes in the final three minutes, including a power play, but credit Kubryskyi for standing tall stopping every frantic shot by the Sun Devils.
Arizona State (4-5-1) still leads the series between the two schools 14-12.
The Lopes improved to (7-4-0) after a split over the weekend with the Sun Devils. Grand Canyon University will travel to Salt Lake City to play the Utah Utes on Friday and Saturday. Both games start at 7:30pm.
GRAND CANYON ANTELOPES 2, ARIZONA STATE SUN DEVILS 1
Period- 1 2 3 – T
Arizona State 0 1 0 – 1
Grand Canyon 0 2 0 – 2
Scoring Summary
ASU- Goal by Chase, 19:05 2nd Period
GCU-Goal by Misialek, 11:14 2nd Period
GCU-Goal by Oakland, 6:26 2nd Period
