The Lakers lost a heart-breaker in the SUNYAC Championship game last night to the Plattsburgh Cardinals in a game that could end their season. Oswego went into the game sitting in a strong first place in the SUNYAC and had breezed through the playoffs up until last night. Plattsburgh was in a strong second place and had had trouble in the playoffs, getting taken to triple overtime last week at home against Buff State.
In a game that matched two strong defensive teams with two excellent D-I transfer goalies and great penalty kills, the first period went by scoreless. Oswego got the scoring started at 9:15 in the second period when Jon Whitelaw scored on a five-on-three power play from an assist by Paul Rodrigues. Plattsburgh struck back at 18:49 in the second when Jared Docking scored on a power play with assists from Nick Jensen and Paul Puglisi.
Tied at one in the third, Plattsburgh took a lead at 4:33 on a goal by Mike Grace with an assist from Matt MacLeod. The Cardinals sealed the deal at 8:26 in the third on a second goal by Jensen with an assist from Kyle Kudroch. Oswego started a comeback only seven seconds later when Kyle Badham scored on an unassisted goal at 8:33, but were stifled by Platty's defense the rest of the way.
Plattsburgh out-shot Oswego 27 to 17. Mathieu Cadieux went 15 for 17 in the net for Plattsburgh while Andrew Hare went 24 for 27 in the net for the Lakers. Both teams demonstrated a characteristically-strong penalty kill, and Oswego essentially lost the game when they went one-for-five on power plays against the Cardinals, and their only power-play-goal came on a five-on-three power play. Plattsburgh only had two power plays and scored on one of them.
With the win and the SUNYAC crown Plattsburgh receives an automatic bid into the NCAA tournament which will culminate in the Frozen Four at the Herb Brooks Arena in Lake Placid, New York on March 16 and 17. They are in line to be ranked as the number two or three team in the East bracket.
Oswego will now have to rely on an at-large bid from the NCAA if they have any hopes of continuing their season in the NCAA tournament. Currently ranked number one in the nation, that bid should be all-but ensured, but the keywords in that statement are "all" and "but." The number-one ranked team usually makes it into the tournament but stranger things have happened and you can never trust the at-large bid selecting committee. Last season Castleton was ranked in prime position to receive an at-large bid but were snubbed in favor of Neumann, who were ranked seven positions lower than the Spartans at the time. In addition, the well-known Oswego bias on the NCAA selecting committee could prevent them from receiving a bid into the tourney.
NCAA at-large bids, playoff rankings, and brackets will be announced tonight at 9:30.
Wrong....check the NCAA rankings criteria and the published rankings through last week.....Oswego will be 2E...second in the east behind Norwich and host a quarterfinal game next week...the committee will not have them so low that they participate in the play-in round. Not gonna happen. Castleton didn't get in last year because of a lousy out of conference schedule....Nuemann plays a much tougher sched - you are confusing popular polls with NCAA ranking criteria....the bias you speak of is in the blogs, not the committee....the bloggers don't get to vote....
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