Potsdam, NY - Highlighted by four goals from the Class of 2008 on Saturday, the Clarkson University Hockey team closed out the regular season in style to complete a weekend sweep at Cheel Arena. After claiming the Cleary Cup as ECAC Hockey Regular Season Champions on Friday night, the Golden Knights came back with their most dominating win in over 11 years, an 8-0 victory over Quinnipiac before 3,013 fans on Clarkson’s Senior Night.
Posting a 20-win campaign for the second consecutive season, the ninth-ranked Golden Knights improved their record to 20-10-4 overall and finished with a first-place 15-4-3 ECAC Hockey mark. Clarkson, which won the program’s 10th conference regular-season title on Friday with a 4-3 triumph over second place Princeton, will now have a weekend off as the number-1 seed in the league playoffs. The Knights will host an ECAC Hockey quarterfinal round series on the weekend of March 14-16 against the lowest remaining seed from first-round play.
The Green and Gold jumped out to a commanding 4-0 first-period lead against Quinnipiac and never looked back as they extended their home unbeaten streak against conference foes to 22 straight games (17-0-5). The eight-goal win was Clarkson’s largest margin in victory since defeating Rensselaer 11-0 on November 22, 1997.
Freshman defenseman Bryan Rufenach (Cameron, ONT) started the scoring parade for the Knights with his second goal of the season on a wrist shot from the blueline at 10:51. Junior Chris D’Alvise (Mississauga, ONT) and freshman Scott Freeman (Whitby, ONT) assisted.
At 13:55, senior defenseman Grant Clitsome (Gloucester, ONT) tallied the first of three Clarkson shorthanded goals, flipping in a backhand shot in tight off a pass from sophomore Matt Beca (Mississauga, ONT) for his fifth goal of the year.
D’Alvise made it 3-0 at 16:50, knocking in a rebound off of senior Nick Dodge’s (Oakville, ONT) shot for a power-play marker and his 11th goal of the year.
With 9.4 second left in the period, senior Steve Zalewski (New Hartford, NY) completed the Knights’ most productive offensive period of the season, scoring his team-high 19th goal of the year, a shorthanded tally with Clitsome and Beca assisting.
Clarkson showed no signs of letting up to start the second as Beca scored just 23 seconds into the stanza for the Knights’ third shorthanded marker. Zalewski set up Beca’s 10th goal of the season.
Just 1:41 into the middle frame, Clarkson made it 6-0. Senior Mike Arciero (Avon, CT) dove around a defenseman in front of the crease and slapped in a rebound off sophomore Tim Marks’ (Brownville, NY) shot to put his second goal of the season on the highlight reel.
Senior David Cayer (Lonqueuil, QUE) gave Clarkson a 3-0 lead 5:06 in the third, knocking in a rebound off junior Shea Guthrie’s shot (Carleton Place, ONT) for his eighth goal of the year. Freshman Brandon Defazio (Oakville, ONT) also assisted.
Clarkson’s freshmen class combined for the eighth goal, a power-play marker with 2:12 remaining from Rufenach with Freeman and Lauri Tuohimaa (Helsinki, Finland), with his third assist of the game, setting up the goal.
Quinnipiac held a slight 26-25 shot advantage, but senior David Leggio (Williamsville, NY) and sophomore Tim Potter (Bakersfield, CA) combined for Clarkson’s fifth shutout of the year. Leggio improved his record to 20-9-4, making 12 saves through 31:50 of play. Potter played the final 28:10 in the Knights’ net and finished with 14 stops.
Clarkson was 2-of-6 on the power play, killed off seven Bobcats man-advantage opportunities and tallied three times shorthanded for its best night of the season on specialty teams.
