By Ryan Nelson
The Syracuse Orange (13-13-3) will host their final series of the regular season this weekend as they welcome the Delaware Blue Hens (20-9-2) to the Tennity Ice Pavilion. The Orange and Blue Hens already faced each other earlier this season in Delaware where the home team took both games by scores of 4-2 and 4-1.
For the Orange, they’re looking to flip the script to end the season and continue a winning streak which started last weekend against Niagara. During those games there were two players who stood out among the rest, Ford Hatchett and Matt Jacobs.
Both performers contributed ten points over the two game stretch. Jacobs himself has three goals and three assists and even impressed his teammates with his showing on the ice.
“He [Jacobs] was a man on a mission and really carried us offensively last weekend,” said junior defender Ford Hatchett.
Although Jacobs might have been on a mission, Hatchett was along for the journey. He was second in team scoring on the weekend and continued to impress offensively from the blue line.
The blue line, as well as netminder Eric Parker, were the real showstoppers last weekend. The three goals allowed in each of the games were good rebounds after the 14 goals they allowed the weekend prior.
The Orange will need to keep up this defensive play against a Blue Hen squad that has three players performing over a point per game. One of these players is Michael Nisky, who is the leading assist-getter for Delaware, is looking to get his team back over the 20 win mark after falling short last season.
For the Syracuse seniors, this will be there last chance to impress in front of their home crowd at the Tennity Ice Pavilion, but Hatchett says that atmosphere hasn’t faltered.
“The atmosphere around the team is strong. I think we are excited to close out strong. To be honest, it still hasn’t quite hit me that this is the last set of games at the [Tennity] with this class of seniors,” said the alternate captain. “These guys are some of my best friends and we’ve seen each other at our bests and our worsts.”
The Syracuse Orange will have this chance to close out strong at 7 p.m. on Saturday night and at 2 p.m. on Sunday for Senior Day. You can watch the game at the Tennity Ice Pavilion or tune in live at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCgh_0GA1RxNM8z0tXPRFiiw/videos.
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