The ASU club hockey team took Iowa by storm over the weekend, as the No. 10 Sun Devils (4-0) swept No. 5 Iowa State (3-5) in convincing fashion.
The Sun Devils went rolling into Iowa following a two-win weekend against UA.
ASU coach Greg Powers had his hands full with last year’s American Collegiate Hockey Association national champion runner-up, but once again pushed all the right buttons.
The Sun Devils relied on their old guard to do a lot of the heavy lifting as Powers was forced to mix and match lines with sophomore forwards David Jantzie and Zach Greenwald suspended for fighting, and sophomore defenseman Brian Parson shelved with an ankle injury.
It was ASU’s senior forward Pat Lind who got the job done on Friday as the Sun Devils took down ISU 3-2 behind a pair of Lind goals.
“I felt great, especially back on the wing,” Lind said. “I got some chances and capitalized.”
The game was a defensive battle, and it was the Sun Devils’ senior goalie Mark Schacker who got the job done between the pipes. Schacker posted his first shutout of the year on Saturday.
It was all Sun Devils in game two as ASU romped to a 5-0 win.
“The light just went on,” Powers said.
Senior forward Paul Scola and sophomore forward Danny McAuliffe each had a pair of goals.
McAuliffe scored three goals over the weekend, his first three as a Sun Devil.
Senior forward Joe Schweiger netted his team-leading fourth goal of the season to give him 99 in his career. Schweiger, Scola, Lind and Schacker are all in their final seasons and have just one more chance to win a national championship.
The four seniors make up the core of the team and will need to be at the top of their games if ASU is going to make a deep run in the tournament this season.
The seniors know how much pressure is on them to produce.
“They’re just playing the game and trying not to think about too much of the other stuff,” Schweiger said.
Things only get tougher for ASU as No. 3 Oklahoma (7-3) makes the trip to Tempe this weekend to take on the undefeated Sun Devils. The Sooners were on a roll before running into defending national champion and No. 1 ranked Lindenwood (5-1) last weekend.
OU returned a good chunk of its core talent that went 3-1 against ASU last season. The two teams split the games in Tempe last year, but the Sun Devils have revenge on their mind.
With the new recruits starting to find their niche in the desert, ASU is hungry for another pair of victories.
“The team got a taste of how good they could be this weekend,” Powers said.
Oklahoma represents another enormous challenge for a Sun Devil team that appears ready to take on any challenge thrown at them.
“We truly expect to win every game we play, and there is no reason that we can’t,” Powers said. “It’s not arrogance, it’s confidence.”
The Sun Devils take on Oklahoma at 7:30 p.m. on Friday and 6:15 p.m. on Saturday at Oceanside Ice Arena in Tempe.
Reach the reporter at nlicalzi@asu.edu
