BOWLING GREEN — During a season with far fewer games and no standard PairWise rankings to seed the NCAA tournament, Bowling Green picked up another of college hockey's most valuable chips: A nonconference win.
The Falcons scored twice in three minutes early in the third period and weathered Robert Morris' six-on-four push at the final horn to score a 2-1 win against the Colonials on Tuesday at Slater Family Ice Arena.
The Falcons have been able to play 10 games — winning nine — and are ranked No. 7 in the country as one of only a handful of college teams playing true nonconference games.
After the season seemed in jeopardy months ago, Bowling Green will make it New Year’s Day with close to a best-case scenario for the first two months of the season.
“I thought that was just kind of a hope and a dream at that time, so we've been very fortunate our coaching staff and our university allowed us to play and put us in a position where we can go play on the road and have great teams in,” said BG captain Connor Ford, who scored the tying goal Tuesday.
“It takes a group effort, it takes a village to make this happen.”
After more than 36 scoreless minutes on Tuesday, RMU’s Grant Hebert broke through with the game's first goal in the second period.
Robert Morris took a penalty in the final minute of the period, however, and the Falcons made the chance count in the third.
Ford scored 36 seconds into the period, followed by Will Cullen's goal fewer than three minutes later to take a lead they protected through a late penalty kill and RMU pulling its goaltender.
The result was another quality win for the Falcons, who swept a road series at No. 11 Quinnipiac in addition to the home-and-home series with Robert Morris, which just missed the top-20 poll this week.
With so many unknowns this season, BG coach Ty Eigner said the Falcons have approached every game like a chance to add to a bank account.
“Keep investing into your account and building up equity, because every time you get a chance to play, that's an opportunity to do that,” Eigner said.
“You never know what's going to happen, so any time you can bank a win and be sitting here with, ‘Here's our resume, here's what we have,' that's a good thing.”
The Falcons have only Western Collegiate Hockey Association opponents remaining on the schedule, though four of the planned games will not count in the league standings.
Bowling Green will begin play in the WCHA on Saturday at Ferris State.
The Falcons' past two games have been come-from-behind victories, which they took as a positive sign going into league play.
“That's something that, over my tenure here — especially in the second half of the season — we had a hard time finding a way to win those games,” Ford said. “That's just a really strong sign of mental toughness and how good of a hockey team we have here.
“I'm really looking forward to the next two months of conference play. I think we're going to be very successful.”
Dating back to last season, the Falcons are 17-1-2 in their past 20 games.
While league play will determine much of the season for BG, nonconference play went about as well as the Falcons could have hoped.
“To be able to get in the number of games we've gotten in has been great for us, and then you'll certainly take the record,” Eigner said.
“To win nine out of 10, I don't care where you're playing, you're doing a pretty good job.”
First Published December 30, 2020, 12:23 a.m.
