TROY -- Hey folks. Had to tend to some family matters over the past few days but I wanted to share some post-game comments from the Engineers' big 4-1 victory over Boston University on Saturday.
First, though, senior center Chase Polacek has been named Inside College Hockey's Player of the Week.
And junior Allen York was named Goaltender of the Week by ECAC Hockey.
Polacek scored one goal and assisted on two others in the big victory over then-7th-ranked BU.
Polacek, the reigning ECACH scoring champion, has seven points over RPI's past two games.
He leads the Engineers in scoring with 23 points (8-15-23) and assists and has at least one point in 13 of RPI's 16 games. He also has seven multi-point games.
York made several brilliant saves among his 28 in the victory over BU. The only shot that got by him came after a turnover 15 feet in front of him. He lowered his goals against average to 1.88 and his saves percentage to 93.0.
The victory over BU moved the Engineers to the No. 13 spot in the U.S. College Hockey Online poll.
Kennedy enjoying victories, but ...: ... he'd much rather be playing, of course.
This writer joked that the Engineers don't need him, winning five of the six games he's missed with a hand injury.
"Apparently not," he said. "We're rolling right now and we just want to keep going this way.
"It was awesome," Kennedy said of the nationally-televised triumph. "Seeing the guys playing for one another, playing for the crest on their chest. It was a big win for the team but also for the program and what we're trying to do."
Solid effort but not "special": Head coach Seth Appert didn't want to downplay the victory over Boston U. but he didn't want it to be exaggerated, either. He spoke of the Engineers' effort.
"Our effort was pretty good but I don't think it was special but that's a credit to BU," he said.
"I told our guys, 'when you play a really good team -- Yale, Union, BU -- no matter how good you play, no matter how hard you play, you can't control the game for 60 minutes. There are ebbs and flows and what you need to do is survive the valleys in your game, and the push-backs from your opponent. I thought at times tonight we were a little hyper when (BU) pushed back but we continued to play hard. I thought we turned the puck too much but we continued to play hard and continued to have good goaltending from Allen."
Blanked in five-on-five play: The Engineers produced three power-play goals and a shorthanded goal and thus, were blanked in 5-on-5 play. While Appert had proclaimed that the Engineers' special teams needed to improve. Together, the power play and penalty killing were as solid as they've been in any game this season.
"We believe in our team 5-on-5," Appert said. "We got outscored 1-0 (during) 5-on-5 play but there haven't been many games we've been outscored 5-on-5 this season (four). I'll stake our team against any team in the country 5-on-5.
"What was great to see was our special teams come through like that."