Perhaps it was the feeling of being back at home, or the impressive crowd that filled the bleachers at Oceanside Arena, but the same Sun Devil team that impressed fans and critics alike in a drubbing of Arizona in the team's season opener showed up on the ice Friday evening to overwhelm the Southern New Hampshire Penmen 9-2.
Heading into the two game homestand, ASU head Coach Greg Powers emphasized improvement on both sides of the power play for the Sun Devils, hoping that the goals that found their way in at Gila River Arena three weeks prior had eyes for the net once again.
"Good game, good way to bounce back after a tough East coast road trip," Powers said after the win. "To get some sustained offensive pressure was nice, it was just a good effort."
Starting in net for ASU for the first time in his NCAA Division I career was freshman goaltender David Jacobson hailing from Calabasas, California. Jacobson made his debut for the Sun Devils the weekend before against UConn where he made 28 saves and only let in one goal.
Things looked dark early, however, as the Sun Devils got burned on a near-ice change allowing sophomore Kyle Valliere to walk in and score the game's first goal top shelf over the right shoulder of Jacobson.
He finished with 14 saves and two goals allowed.
It took nearly ten minutes for the Sun Devils to find their mojo, including two breakaway chances that came up empty, but following an early goal waved off for Joe Lappin, ASU struck 14:28 into the frame and freshman defenseman Nicholas Gushue scored his first goal of the season; ASU's first power play goal since playing in Alaska two weeks prior.
"It was exciting to get my first goal as a Sun Devil and [there's] many more to come hopefully," Gushue told reporters following the game."We capitalized on a lot of our opportunities."
Gushue added another goal just two minutes later, and then assisted a goal for freshman forward Jack Rowe with less than two to go. The Sun Devils were suddenly up 3-1.
After tacking on one more goal with just 25 seconds to play, the Sun Devils entered the first intermission with a commanding 4-1 lead after trailing for over half of the first period.
"We wanted to break this game up into three periods and win every period, and we won every period," Powers said. "It's tough to win every period by three, four, five goals ... we found a way to win, no complaints."
The second period was more of the same, as ASU found the net over and over, excelling on their power play with goals on three of their first four man-advantages.
On the other side of the coin, the Sun Devils lasted over 30 minutes of ice time without committing an infraction. Sophomore defenseman Edward McGovern went to the box, but ASU only needed to defend two shots and 23 seconds of shorthanded hockey before the intermission horn blared.
The Sun Devils carried a 7-1 lead into the second intermission, effectively making the entire third period garbage time. "Taking care of business" played on repeat during the intermission and the feeling that ASU had locked up the game was inevitable.
Heading into the third, Jacobson had saved only 7 shots on net with the Sun Devils throwing 44 shots of their own on senior Penmen goaltender David Letarte; ASU eclipsed its team record for shots (26) in the first period alone with 27.
When the dust settled and the final horn sounded, Jacobson had let in one more goal on a wrist shot from sophomore Sam Jenkins, and the Sun Devils added two of their own including an impressive goal by junior winger Sean Murphy to lift ASU over the Penmen 9-2.
Powers said Jacobson will start in net again for the Sun Devils in Saturday's rematch with Southern New Hampshire.
Puck drop is scheduled for 7:30 p.m. Saturday at Oceanside Ice Arena.
Reach the reporter at csafran@asu.edu and follow @ChrisSafran on Twitter.
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