Ohio's turnout was all too familiar this weekend against No. 16 Illinois.
The No. 11 Bobcats (9-4-1, 27 points) were victorious in an 8-1 landslide Friday before falling by a 5-2 decision the following night. This marks the second consecutive weekend the Bobcats have won the Friday game, which is traditionally the harder of the two road games to win, only before losing Saturday.
“Friday we come in and play really well and then Saturday, I don’t know if guys are complacent, but Saturday’s not our day this year yet,” coach Jonathon Sheridan said. “Just something we’re going to have to work out and stress harder on the guys.”
The team was struck with an injury in warm-ups Friday, as sophomore goalie and Friday’s scheduled starter Aaron Alkema was hit in the head in what Sheridan called a “freak accident.”
The team kept him out of action this weekend as a precaution, but do not believe the injury to be serious.
Friday, sophomore forward Logan Pfeffer had a scoring outburst with two goals, and was one of two Bobcats to finish with four points overall. The other, sophomore forward Derek Rahme, finally had a big night on the score sheet, notching four assists, after playing solid hockey for the past few weeks.
“It was nice to see both of those guys get their reward for how hard they’ve been working,” Sheridan said. “I know Logan was real frustrated that he wasn’t scoring, but he just kept working and it finally came. Derek was more than happy to get on the scoresheet. He’s been playing really well for us the last couple of weeks and it’s nice to see him get rewarded for that.”
The duo’s eight combined points led the way to a thorough defeat of an Illinois team that had dropped eight of nine games against Division I opponents.
After Saturday, that number became eight of ten.
Freshman goalie Ryan Heltion, with the opportunity to play both games of the weekend series, started the contest hot by stopping 24-of-25 shots in the 8-1 victory. However, Saturday produced more difficulty, as a stretch of three unanswered third period goals by the Fighting Illini (7-7-1, 16 points) lead to Ohio’s defeat.
Heltion finished with 18 saves on 22 shots against, and Illinois added an empty net goal late in the third.
The Bobcats did come back from a previous 1-0 deficit however, when freshman forwards Patrick Spellacy and David Ramos scored late first period goals separated by 1:42, but it would not be enough.
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