Sweep Shows Potential and Grit of Ohio Bobcats

ATHENS – This marquee matchup was the perfect rivalry to go hand-in-hand with a packed Bird Arena. Siblings all across campus were witnesses to one great series.

What started as a very paced out game that seemed to take its own time, quickly turned into a runaway game for the Ohio University Bobcats.

“Everyone was really dialed in tonight and they really wanted this one,” head coach Cole Bell said.

The Stony Brook University Seawolves took the ice with grit as they looked to take back what they could in this series. But, the Bobcats could not be stopped for long as Sam Turner took a slick backhand shot that put Ohio up first.

That was his second goal of the weekend, and his third as a Bobcat as well. His performance was a clear indicator of what Ohio Hockey has to look forward to as they progress through the years.

Not only is his presence on the ice during his career vital, his performance in the series was crucial to getting the sweep.

Andrew Wells showed another aspect of reliability to this series. He put his body on the line to keep the Seawolves shots outside of the crease while Jimmy Thomas stood like a brick wall.

Wells scored to push the Bobcats further away from Stony Brook. That goal came just ten seconds into third period.

Thomas showed huge success as well. He made 23 saves and finished with a 95.83% save percentage.

“We did a lot of things really well and Jimmy had some big saves, a lot of them we’re on the first opportunity, he didn’t have to make to many second opportunity saves,” Bell said.

With another sweep in the books for Ohio, this win means that they can keep pushing forward to try fight into the run for another national championship. Games do still remain in the regular season, as they will travel to Iowa State next, but this is all prep work for them to fight through adversity.

“This was a good, competitive and hard game,” Bell said. “We’re getting ready for playoffs here.”

The competition in this series was shown. Ohio and Stony Brook spent a lot of time in the box, as there were four examples of four-on-four action in this game when it came down to the wire.

The sweep is a confidence booster for Ohio, Stony Brook was ranked 7th in the beginning of the series while Ohio was 9th. With that sweep done, they can continue their trek through the rest of the season.

“This is a big pivotal point in our season,” Jimmy Thomas said. “Obviously the last few Fridays we have been struggling and this is a good point.”

Ohio will travel all the way to Iowa State next weekend.