Geez, Louise. This thing was a train wreck from start to finish. No. 15 Bowling Green reeled off three goals on its first five shots of the game. The Falcons never looked back as they steamrolled No. 4 Ohio State, 8-2.
| Scoring by Period | 1 | 2 | 3 | Final |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| No. 15 Bowling Green | 4 | 3 | 1 | 8 |
| No. 4 Ohio State | 0 | 0 | 2 | 2 |
Once again, the Buckeyes were slow out of the gate. They looked like the road team with the bus legs. Bowling Green was flying.
The Falcons hustled out to a three-goal lead in the first six minutes of the game. Sean Romeo started the night in net for the Buckeyes. He surrendered four goals on eight shots.
| Buckeye Goal Scorers (Assists) | Pd | Time |
|---|---|---|
| Mason Jobst (Carson Meyer, Freddy Gerard) | 3 | 6:07 |
| PP - John Wiitala (Gustaf Westlund, Gordi Myer) | 3 | 6:54 |
Tommy Nappier relieved Romeo in the first period. BGSU dinged Nappier twice in seven attempts. He was replaced by Evan Moyse in the second period.
The Falcons got Moyse twice in 13 tries. He finished the game with 11 saves. These were more saves than Romeo and Nappier recorded tonight combined.
This game was well over before they dropped the puck in the third period, but the Bucks did at least manage to make it onto the scoreboard. Carson Meyer and Mason Jobst hooked up for a Buckeye goal in the final frame. Jobst’s third tally of the season spoiled Ryan Bednard’s shutout.
John Wiitala potted a power play goal 47 seconds later. But just when it looked as though the Bucks had righted their ship and salvaged a shred of dignity, Stephen Baylis put another shorthanded goal in the back of the OSU net. While the Buckeyes were on a 5-on-3.
It was evident early on that this game was never going to end in anything other than a huge, embarrassing loss. Ohio State somehow outshot Bowling Green 33-28 in the contest, but the Buckeyes never looked like a worthy opponent for the Falcons, let alone the higher ranked team in the match-up.
BGSU crushed the special teams battle, going 4-for-8 on the power play and adding two shorthanded tallies. Max Johnson led Bowling Green with a hat trick of PPGs. OSU was 1-for-7 on the advantage.
Adding potential injury to insult, Tanner Laczynski was absent from the Buckeye bench in the third period. So yeah. Wire-to-wire train wreck.
In the grand scheme of things, one loss isn't going to break the Bucks' season. But a troubling trend is emerging for Ohio State. The team has to find a way to play motivated before falling behind or else the Buckeyes are going to spend a long, sad season in the Big Ten cellar.
On the plus side (if you want to call it that) I’m not sure it’s possible for tomorrow’s series finale to be worse than this. The puck drops in Bowling Green at 7pm ET on Saturday.
