Eastern jumps out to a 4-0 lead after one period, but Dearborn fights back to make it an exciting game of hockey, and the Eagles end up surviving on Senior Night by the score of 8-5.

The Eastern Michigan Eagles put themselves in a great position for the entire game by dominating the first period in every possible statistic except for in shots on goal. The Eagles began the game on all cylinders scoring first a mere 2:51 into the game, on a goal from Dave Stewart that was set up by a picture perfect pass from Matt Opyd along the center of the ice. The Eagles quickly took advantage of a power play opportunity given to them 2 minutes later and made the score 2-0 on a goal from Carl Voelker, with an assist credited to Jeff Jepson. The Eagles third goal of the game was just a wonderful play putting a large amount of pressure on one of Dearborn's players and was awarded with a goal by Charlie Jones, with an assist credited to Josh Barron. The Eagles concluded the scoring in the first period with a wonderful slapshot goal from Matt Opyd, with an assist credited to Carl Voelker. The Eagles played an absolutely wonderful first period, with Pruss making nice saves and the Eagles passing the puck absolutely picture perfect and made it seem as if it would be an easy night to enjoy the Seniors final game at EMU. However, as is unsuprising by any who have seen Michigan-Dearborn play, this was not to be the case.

The second period is when Michigan Dearborn started to really enforce their physical brand of hockey upon the Eagles. Michigan Dearborn opened up the scoring in the second period, on a goal from Michael Crowley which reduced the Eagles lead to 4-1. However, the Eagles quickly responded just a mere 37 seconds later placing themselves back up by 4, on a goal from Steve Kardel, with an assist credited to Aaron Diez. The Wolves of Michigan Dearborn however continued to press the Eagles and were awarded with two more goals in the period. The Wolves second goal scored by Jason Turri was a questionable one, as it was hard to see what exactly happened. The Wolves concluded the scoring in the period on an absolutely blistering slapshot from Joel Kuehn to push the score to 5-3 at the end of the period. With the Michigan Dearborn crowd clearly behind their Wolves, the Wolves really dominated play throughout. The Eagles committed a few penalties which put them on the defensive and really did not get a ton of great opportunities in the period. The style of the Wolves, really puts a lot of pressure on a team to maintain their composure as it is a lot easier to get worn down by the constant checking and by the constant action that their style portrays.

Despite the fact that the Eagles were on their heels for most of the second period, the Eagles quickly were able to get the lead back up to 3 goals, on a goal from Aaron Diez, with an assist from Charlie Jones and Matt Opyd to push the score back up to 6-3. However, "DEARBORN HOCKEY", began to echo throughout the Ice Cube as the Wolves were able to get the score back to within 1 goal with two goals. The next few minutes were tight, hard-hitting hockey as the Wolves continued to press the Eagles constantly and had several good opportunities including one that banged off of the post. The Eagles were on their heels again throughout large portions of the period. However, the Eagles did receive a break late in the third period with a penalty called against the Wolves, and the Eagles took advantage with a mere 2:46 left in the game on a Power Play Goal from Charlie Jones, with an assist to Dave Aliff. This was the goal that broke the back of the Wolves and pushed the score to 7-5. The Eagles quickly pushed this advantage to 8-5, less than a minute later on a goal from Jeremy Majszak, which concluded the scoring of the game at 8-5.

This was truly an incredible game. The fans from Michigan-Dearborn were absolutely outstanding tonight, really adding to the fire of the game and making it a lot more entertaining to watch. Despite the fact that I read on the Hockey101 message boards that several people found the "DEARBORN HOCKEY" chant(based off of the "DE-TROIT Basketball CHANT") to be rather annoying, I found it rather amusing. The Wolves will be a challenge again for any team at the National Tournament as if they can get off to a decent start and establish their physical brand of hockey, they will have a great chance to win at least one or two out in Bensenville. My heart does have to go out for Eric Pagel, who was responsible for the first five goals against vs the Eagles. He had a similar poor outing against the Eagles in the first game at the Ann Arbor Ice Cube, and he was pulled again midway through the second period. Pagel is an outstanding goalie for the Wolves who has had great games for them all season, it is just the Eagles seemed to have his number. I must admit this was more of the performance I expected out of the Wolves instead of what we saw in the Eagles home opener, a 10-2 victory. So heed my warning, watch out for the Wolves.

The Eagles tonight in my opinion played an incredible period of hockey in the first, played as well as they could against an inspired Wolves team and played a resilient third period in which they were put on their heels late in the period and were able to persevere and win the game. I felt however that the Wolves really dominated large portions of the game and really played outstanding and outplayed the Eagles. However, the Eagles were able to early on in periods and in short spurts dominate play enough to give themselves a chance to maintain their lead. It also is a bit disheartening to see a 4-0 lead almost go up in smoke in the final game of the season. Clearly though the Eagles seemed to be tired later on in the third which is the product of Dearborn's style.

For those of you who weren't at the game tonight, the game was not one of the cleanest hockey games I have seen either. The referees by allowing a controversial goal for Dearborn, disallowing a goal for Eastern and calling penalties at odd times, and not calling penalties late in the third really let the game get out of hand. For example, on the goal that was disallowed for Eastern Michigan, the puck was clearly out of the zone when Eastern put the puck on net. The referee who was standing right by the puck, inaccurately ruled that it was not offside and thus allowed the play to continue, in which the Dearborn goalie was interferred with. This led to a disallowed goal and a penalty. Also late in the game, there was a clear cut interference/hooking/roughing call behind the Dearborn net that was not called, which led to both teams hitting each other with a more vicious intent. I'm not really complaining about particular calls, but I don't think they had much control of this game.

Overall though this was a very entertaining game of hockey to watch and I think everyone who was there got their money's worth. However, had the Eagles not played such a brilliant first period we might have been looking at a loss against the Wolves on Senior Night instead of a victory.

Tonight was the final game at the Ann Arbor Ice Cube for five Eastern Michigan Hockey Players. These five individuals have helped to continue the great tradition that we know as EMU Hockey. 

They are as follows:

#6 Carl Buchin- A very disciplined forward for the Eastern Michigan Eagles who took advantage
of the playing time that he was given.

#21 Dave Aliff- An excellent defenseman for the Eastern Michigan Eagles. He was also the one responsible for organizing the excellent Toiletries for Teens Drive for those in need at the Ozone House and Alpha House. His work for the commmunity is admirable and is to be applauded.

#23 Justin Shaw- Helped the scoring load for the Eagles this year with 8 goals and 12 assists and made some really nice passes and goals in the games that we went to this season.

#30 Jake Pruss- All you really need to know about Jake Pruss is his performance in the Friday Night game against the Fighting Illini of Illinois in which he stopped 67 of 69 shots and single handedly led the Eagles to a victory in that game. Jake Pruss in every game that the Eagles won while he was in net, made a key save or two that helped keep the Eagles in the game. Pruss persevered and took complete advantage of his opportunities in nets. The Eagles truly will miss Pruss in net, as he impressed me every single time throughout the season.

#44 Carl Voelker- A tough nosed player who had his eye on the goal every time. Voelker had an outstanding season this year, finishing with 43 points on 12 goals and 31 assists.

The Swoop Zone would like to applaud the efforts of these five seniors who played in their final game tonight. It has been an absolute pleasure to watch you five play on the ice and the Swoop Zone wishes all five of you well on your future endeavors outside of the hockey rink.

Looking Ahead:

The Eagles now look forwards to the CSCHL Championships to take place at Kent State University. The Eagles are the #3 seed in the tournament and will take on the host Kent State Golden Flashes in their first round game. This game will be Friday, February 18th @ 8:00 PM EDT.

Good Luck to the Eagles, and thanks for another great season of EMU Hockey!
-Kevin