Powers clash in national title rematch

This weekend, the 6-0 IU club hockey team will take on the team that beat them in the American Collegiate Hockey Association Division II National Championship game last season.

The Hoosiers will face off with Davenport, a team that heads into Friday’s game with an 11-0 record.

Both Friday’s and Saturday’s games will take place in Grand Rapids, Mich..
The game is the first between the two teams since the title game.

Forward Adam Fishbein was on the second-place team last season. He said he feels ready to take on the defending champs.

“I’m as confident as ever,” Fishbein said. “It’s a matchup of the No. 1 and No. 2 teams in the country.”

Goalie Justin Lincoln tended the net in the championship game as a freshman. He said he feels this game is important for the Hoosiers as the entire league will be watching.

“It’s going to be proving ourselves to the league, that we’re going to be a top contender for nationals again,” Lincoln said. “It’s going to be a big revenge showing.”

Lincoln  said he is eager for his team to put last season’s loss behind them.

“This is what we’ve been looking forward to,” he said. “This is what we’ve been training for.”

Coach Tom Orr said he realizes the importance this game has to more than just the two teams involved.

“It’s not only a big game for us, it’s a big game for the entire league,” Orr said. “It’s the matchup of the two teams that were in the championship last year, and we’re both coming in undefeated. It’s really the showdown we’ve been looking for all year.”

But still, Orr said he hopes the game will be like any other despite the overall significance it could have.

“As a coach, you hope it’s just another game as usual where the guys do the thing they’re supposed to do,” he said. “You can’t really run around the fact that this is the game we’ve been prepping for. There is certainly a great amount of urgency and need to do the best we can do.”

Orr also said part of what makes Davenport successful is that its athletics director is also its head coach, giving the team plenty of resources.

“They’re a balanced team,” he said. “Their goalie is good, their forwards are good, and their defensemen are good, and that’s usually how you win a national championship.”

Fishbein said he knows that a game like this will be intense.

“It’ll be a very aggressive, high-intensity game,” he said. “We’re definitely going to light the lumber.”