In a tough fought game for both teams, the Oswego State men’s ice hockey team was victorious over the Carleton Place Canadians in a 5-3 victory on Oct. 27.

The game was an exhibition game for both teams, and was the Lakers’ second game before heading into the regular season on Nov. 2 against SUNY Cortland. Carleton Place will take on the Nepean Raiders on Oct. 31.

Oswego State was led by freshman Travis Broughman, who, due to the amount of players the Lakers had, only played half of the game. In that time span, he had a goal, which was the Lakers’ first, and an assist. His goal was assisted by Anthony Passero and Tanner Spink.

“He played extremely hard for the period and a half that he was in. I was very pleased with him,” head coach Ed Gosek said. “I thought he did a lot of good things the first part of the game.”

Another player that stood out for Gosek, despite scoring no points, was Michael Gillespie. The junior had four shots in the game, and plenty more which were not on goal. Gosek said that once Gillespie gets back to his form from last season, the expectations will remain the same for him.

“I thought he created a lot of opportunities. That’s the positive, that he’s putting himself in the position to get the puck and get those shots on net,” Gosek said. “It’s good to have him back in the lineup and keep him healthy. I think that line, Gillespie, Zizek, Brown, all did a nice job.”

Compared to previous seasons, Oswego State was taking on a team that was in mid-season form. The Canadians have played 19 official games so far this season. The Lakers used to play the CCHL All-Graduate team, essentially an all-star team, which was formed for one game and did not have a ton of chemistry.

Eight of the players on Carleton Place’s roster are committed to a NCAA Div. I school for hockey, such as Cornell University and Boston University. Gosek said that the Canadians gave the Lakers an opportunity to see and work on their weaknesses for the next week before the regular season begins.

“I don’t want to say [Carleton Place] is a well-oiled machine, but they got more oil than we’ve got,” Gosek said. “There’s a reason we invited them. We knew it would be a good game.”

Similar to last weekend, Oswego State played all of its active players. The team had seven full lines of forwards that split the game and four defensive lines that played the entire game. Goaltender Cedric Hansen played the first two periods, while Steven Kozikoski played the final 20 minutes.

For the next week, Gosek said he and his staff will have to make some decisions heading into the game against the Red Dragons.

“We have a chance, as a staff, to sit down and talk about what we think,” Gosek said. “Especially when it comes to tentative lineups to narrow things down.”

Carleton Place came out with a fast pace to start the game against Oswego State. The Canadians scored 1:45 into the first period, and then continued their scoring at 7:50 on a five-on-three power play. Carter Allen was called for a slashing penalty, and then Charlie Pelnik was called for high sticking.

“For us, it’s a good thing as far as some adversity early on,” Gosek said. “To have to come from behind and stick with our plan, I think it was a process. The guys learned a lot tonight.”

Broughman scored at 15:47 of the first period to bring the game back within one. Broughman played with the Canadians last season in the CCHL.

“It’s a credit to [Carleton Place] that they came out with a lot of jump. Unlike last weekend, we didn’t,” Gosek said. “We came out flat, a little slow. We weren’t ready to compete at the level that they were.”

The initial goal would bring momentum for the Lakers, scoring three-straight goals throughout the second and third periods. Joseph Molinaro, Tanner Spink and Tyson Bruce all had goals. Molinaro’s was a power play goal.

Anthony Passero, in just his second game with the Lakers after transferring from Buffalo State, had three assists in the game.

“We’d love to have that [firing pace all the time]. Is that realistic? I don’t know,” Gosek said. “We like our depth, tonight we had a lot of different guys contribute.”

The Lakers were able to keep a majority of the pressure in their offensive zone. That was until AJ D’Orazio was called for an interference at 15:22. Added on to that, Allen, for his second penalty of the night, was called on a tripping penalty around 30 seconds later.

Despite being on the five-on-three penalty kill for around 1:30, Oswego State was able to come out unscathed and preserve its 4-3 lead.

“You don’t need to play a high-risk game. You need to play an intelligent, high-percentage game,” Gosek said. “High-percentage plays, discipline, don’t need offensive zone penalties are all the things we talked about. Unfortunately, we did some of them. That’s all part of the process. You learn from it and you move on.”

Now, Gosek and the rest of his staff will have a week of practices to move on from some of those mistakes before the regular season on Nov. 2. SUNY Cortland will come to the Marano Campus Center Ice Arena to start the SUNYAC schedule for both teams.

But, when it comes to the roster, Gosek is going in with the mindset of consistency, and he said he will have to make some hard decisions when it comes to the starting lineup against the Red Dragons.

“We’ve said it to the team, we’re looking for guys to consistently bring us what we’re looking for,” Gosek said. “There’s going to be a lot of guys that are in that area that we’re going to have to make tough decisions on that have played well.”

Photo: Kyle Hurley | The Oswegonian