The Quinnipiac Bobcats won their first ECAC title on Saturday winning the Whitelaw Cup with a 4-1 win over Harvard.
Despite having one of the top teams in the nation for the last five years, the Bobcats had never won the title, but thanks to major contributions from Greater Trail players, Quinnipiac was able to pull it off this year.
“We won a Whitelaw Cup, we’re excited about it, we’ve got a great group of guys,” said Quinnipiac coach Rand Pecknold. “Yeah, we wanted to win this, but if you think about people saying [the lack of a Whitelaw Cup] is a knock on our program, I think that’s just negativity from the media.”
Tim Clifton, Bo Pieper and K.J. Tiefenwerth sent the Bobcats to a 3-0 lead eight minutes into the second period, and Michael Garteig stopped 24 shots on the way to the 4-1 victory. Former Trail Smoke Eater captain Scott Davidson scored into an empty net to ice it, with another Trail product, Travis St. Denis, assisting on the play.
“It’s huge,” said Quinnipiac senior captain Soren Jonzzon. “Our senior class is out of this world right now. The last four years we’ve had some good teams and to finally come away with one is unbelievable.”
Quinnipiac beat Dartmouth 3-1 in the semifinal on Friday to advance to Saturday’s final. St. Denis assisted on Sam Anas’ game winning goal 54 seconds into the middle frame, and Trail native Craig Martin collected his first NCAA goal to give the ‘Cats a 3-0 lead.
With the victory, Quinnipiac reclaimed the Number-1 ranking in the nation from the University of North Dakota who lost to No. 16 Minnesota-Duluth 4-2 in the NCHC semifinal.
In the WCHA tournament, Michigan Tech, with Trail native Jake Lucchini and former Smoke Eater Brent Baltus in the line up, lost a close 1-0 match to Ferris State in the semifinal. Ferris State went on to win the WCHA title match 2-1 over Minnesota State.
