Union Travels to Two Tough Buildings This Weekend

Prior to the beginning of the season I thought that the trip to Colgate and Cornell would be one of the most difficult one's of the year. I thought both of these teams would be competing for an ECAC championship (and so did the Coaches and Media). But, both the Raiders and Big Red have struggled to begin the ECAC season as both are in the bottom half of the standings with Colgate being in dead last. While I am more confident about Union's chances this weekend there are still reasons to worry. I do think Union will pick up two wins this weekend, but I would not be shocked if they lost one or both of these games for these two reasons:

Starr Rink

1. The Starr Curse: The Dutchmen have played 22 games at Colgate's Starr rink and they've only picked up ONE WIN going 1-20-1. The last time Union won a game at Colgate was in 1998 when Trevor Koening was in net (Check out Ken Schott's article about the win here). No player on Union's current roster has ever won a game at Starr. There is really no rhyme or reason to this trend, but the Dutchmen will have to find a way to break the curse... and this would be the perfect time to do so considering the Raiders have only won one game in their past 16 (1-14-1), including a seven game losing streak (three loses in OT).

Lynah Rink

2. Lynah Rink's atmosphere: Maybe a reason why Union has had so much trouble at Colgate is because they are looking ahead to playing at Cornell the next night, which is a pretty daunting task. Cornell's Lynah rink is the toughest building to play in the ECAC and one of the toughest in the country. The Big Red fans always pack the place and are extremely loud. They have some of the best fans in the country as they have a great pep band and entertaining chants. If you come out without alive without a loss at Cornell, you've done a good job. Cornell might be down as of this moment, but they are extremely dangerous. They just beat Quinnipiac and Princeton on the road.

Here are some players to look out for this weekend:

Colgate:
Austin Smith (forward): leads team with 12 assists and 17 points. He was named All-ECAC this preseason.
Francois Brisebois (forward): second on the team with 16 points.
Brian Day (forward): leads the team in goals (8), power-play goals (4), and penalty minutes (28). I picked him as All-ECAC this preseason and predicted that he would have a huge year.

Cornell:
Nick D'Agostino (defense): leads the team with six goals, tied for second with five assists, and is second with 11 points... AS A DEFENSEMAN! This actually comes as no surprise to me since I picked him to my Preseason All-ECAC team.
Greg Miller (forward): leads team with 10 assists and 12 points.
Joe & Mike Devin (forward & defense): the two senior brothers are big powerful players. Joe is tied for second on the team with five goals and is thrid with 10 points, wile Mike leads the team with 24 penalty minutes. Their younger sister Molly-Kate is a sophomore on Union's Women's Hockey team.

Union:
Kyle Bodie (forward): played very well last weekend as he picked up four points and was named the ECAC Player of the Week. Let's see if he can follow it up with another good performance and solidify his spot in the lineup.
Andrew Buote (forward): was a healty scratch for the first time in a long time last Saturday against Clarkson. Leaman says he's "challenging the seniors," so let's see how he responds.
Adam Presizniuk (forward): he finally broke the all-time points record last weekend, which was probably nice to just get out of the way. This weekend is his third weekend back since returning from his thumb injury. Now with the record out of the way and his thumb feeling better let's see if Prezie goes on a tear.

For more on the games check out:
Union Athletics.com
Go Colgate Raiders.com
The Unofficial Colgate Hockey Blog
Ken Schott's Blog --> He has tonight's starting lineups
Cornell Big Red.com

Also, Union Assistant SID Jeff Weinstein will be live chatting tonight from Starr Rink. To access the Live Chat click here.