The Gustavus Adolphus men’s hockey team put their first mark in the win column for the 2006-07 season with a 2-1 victory over Concordia-Moorhead Friday night in Moorhead. It was the MIAC opener for both schools.
Jon Keseley (Sr., St. Louis Park, Minn.) scored the Gusties’ first goal on a power play with just three seconds remaining in the first period. Steven Jensen (Sr., Kentwood, Mich.) and Joe Welch (Fr., Hastings, Minn.) were credited with assists on the play.
After neither team lit the lamp in the second period, the Gusties wasted little time extending their lead to 2-0 in the third period. Kyle Rohlfs (Jr., Fergus Falls, Minn.) used assists from Matthew Andres (Fr., Edina, Minn.) and Mike Carr (So., Pine Prings, Minn.) to net the eventual game-winner at the 3:12 mark of the period.
Concordia was given a good opportunity to gain back some ground on Gustavus less than a minute after Rohlfs’ goal as Gustavus’ Sami Idris (Jr., Gothenburg, SWE) and Niko Suoraniemi (Jr., Angelholm, SWE) were sent to the penalty box for unrelated infractions. The Gusties came within six seconds of killing off the two-player advantage, but Knut Bitustoeyl stuck a shot past Gustavus goalie Kevin Johnson (So., Wayzata, Minn.) to cut the lead to 2-1. Despite a number of power-play chances for both teams, neither was able to light the lamp again, leaving the Gusties with a 2-1 victory.
The Gusties outshot the Cobbers 33-19, but found the net on only one of nine power-play opportunities. The Cobbers fared about as well with the extra skater, going 1-for-8.
Kevin Johnson made 18 stops in net for Gustavus to move to 1-2-0 on the season, while his Cobber counterpart, Jeremy Boniface, turned away 31 shots to keep Concordia in the game to the very end.
The Gusties improve to 1-3-1 overall, 1-0-0 in the MIAC. Concordia picks up its first loss of the young campaign, dropping to 3-1-0 overall, 0-1-0 in the MIAC. The teams will play again Saturday afternoon.