Senior forward Liam Norris skates with the puck in a game against Arizona on Saturday, Jan. 31, 2015, at Oceanside Ice Arena in Tempe. The Sun Devils defeated the Wildcats 7-2. (Ben Moffat/The State Press)With the national tournament on their minds, No. 1 ASU hockey (31-3-1) heads to Tucson this weekend for one last away series against No. 25 Arizona (11-20-3).
The big difference this weekend is that the Sun Devils are back at full strength thanks to the return of the six players that traveled to Spain for the University Games.
The last time these two teams played each other was a short three weeks ago and since then the Sun Devils have had a very strong three games, going 3-0 against No. 20 Colorado State (17-20-1) and No. 16 Colorado (14-14-2) during their away series. During these games, many different players were able to step up with six key players off in Spain.
This opportunity started with the previous games against Arizona at Oceanside Arena. On Jan. 30, ASU shut out Arizona 7-0 with a hat trick from sophomore forward Patrick Yudez and sophomore goalie Robert Levin’s eighth shutout of the season.
The team went on to defeat the Wildcats again on Jan. 31 with a strong performance from the Norris brothers. Sophomore forward David Norris had a hat trick during this game with two of those goals scored off the assists from senior forward Liam Norris during his last home game as a Sun Devil.
ASU traveled to Colorado the following weekend and the strong performances continued, with ASU dominating despite missing those six guys.
During their weekend opener and only game against Colorado State on Feb. 5, the Sun Devils won 7-3 with a hat trick from sophomore left wing Eric Rivard, his second of the season. This was also the first game for freshman goalie Jordan Gluck since Nov. 7 and he recorded 27 saves and only let three shots in.
The last games of the weekend were also victories for the Sun Devils with strong performances from the Norris brothers and Levin. Liam Norris had a hat trick during the Colorado game on Feb. 7 with all three goals off the assists from David Norris. The brothers showed off their synergy these past couple of weeks. After taking a couple games off, Levin was back in the net against Colorado and as always had some great saves and a great goals-against average.
These players stepped it up and dominated at home and away. It will be interesting how this experience helps them with the whole team back this weekend.
ASU already earned their No. 1 spot for the ACHA national tournament so this game is really an opportunity for ASU to get in the tournament mindset and it allows them one last series before the tournament starts in early March.
Arizona had a similar two weeks as the Wildcats traveled to Colorado as well, with one game against Colorado and two with Colorado State, but the outcomes were not the same. The Wildcats were unable to defeat the Buffaloes or the Rams.
On Feb. 5, Colorado defeated Arizona 4-6 and Colorado State did the same on Feb. 6 and 7 with a 8-5 win and 3-0 shutout.
Arizona was not able to clinch a playoff stop for the ACHA championship so this will be their last series of the season. This does provide an opportunity for Arizona to beat ASU one last time this season.
ASU will play Arizona on Feb. 20 and 21 at the Tucson Convention Center. Both games are expected to start at 7:30 p.m.
Reach the reporter at kewens@asu.edu or follow @katlynewens on Twitter.
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