Weekend Preview: League Showdowns on Tap

ALBANY, N.Y. - With the top eight positions in the league standings separated by a mere seven points, the chase for the ‘Cleary Cup’ is wide open. Five weekends of league action is on the horizon as teams position themselves for postseason play. This weekend’s action features four televised games with Yale at Harvard (NBC Sports Network); Colgate at Cornell (CBS Sports Network); and Clarkson at Union (Time Warner Sports) all playing Friday and Clarkson at Rensselaer (Time Warner Sports) Saturday.

St. Lawrence/Clarkson at Rensselaer/No. 13/14 Union
*Clarkson leads the all-time series against Union, which began with a 5-1 Dutchmen win in Schenectady on January 23, 1925, 27-18-5. Union, however, is on its longest winning streak in the rivalry with eight straight victories and has outscored the Green and Gold 45-14 during the stretch.
*The Golden Knights have won six of the last nine meetings against Rensselaer, including a 4-1 triumph in Potsdam on November 4.
*The Saints will be out to snap a five game league winless streak (0-4-1) and try to gain some ground in the standings.
*The Saints have killed 78.0 percent of opposing power-plays overall and 79.2 percent in league play.
*Junior Nick Bailen (team-high 5 goals, 11 assists), a defenseman, is RPI’s leading scorer with 16 points.
*RPI is 104 for 122 (85.2%), which is 10th in the nation, when shorthanded.
*Junior forward Jeremy Welsh has 15 points (11 goals, four assists) in the last 14 games and has scored a goal in nine of his last 14 contests for the Dutchmen.
*Sophomore Troy Grosenick, who has started 20 of 25 games in net for Union, leads the nation in goals-against average (1.64) and save percentage (.937), and is tied for fifth in shutouts (3).

Brown/Yale at Dartmouth/Harvard
*Harvard, with the nation's best (33 percent) power-play, is 0-3-5 in its last eight games and is coming off a pair of impressive 2-2 ties at Colgate and Cornell.
*Harvard leads the overall series, 135-77-18 with Yale, but the Bulldogs have taken three consecutive and four of the last five.
*The Bulldogs penalty-kill is sixth (87.5) in the country and they are the 11th least penalized team.
*Yale Junior forward Andrew Miller (88 gp, 21-80-101) went over the 100-point mark for his career last weekend with two assists. He currently ranks fifth in Division I with 1.0 assists per game and is 20th in points (1.22).
*Senior forward Doug Jones is four points shy of becoming the 36th player at Dartmouth with 100 in a career (24g, 72a).
*Since taking over as head coach in 1997- 98, Dartmouth head coach Bob Gaudet is 20-9-3 against his former team, Brown.
*For the second year in a row, Bears senior captain Jack Maclellan has been named to the initial group of candi- dates for the 2012 Hobey Baker Award.

Colgate at No. 6/9 Cornell and No. 6/9 Cornell at Colgate
*Colgate is one of four teams in the nation with two skaters with 30 or more points with Austin Smith registering 24 goals and 14 assists and Chris Wagner contributing nine goals and 21 helpers.
*The Raiders started out great this season against ranked opponents with wins over No. 14 Nebraska-Omaha and No. 4/5 Miami, but have just one win in the last five meetings with ranked teams (1-3-1).
*Cornell has just two losses in its last 16 games and its four overall losses are tied with No. 1/1 Minnesota-Duluth for the fewest in the nation.
*The Big Red hasn't lost in the last 11 matchups (8-0-3) against Colgate, with Raiders' last victory coming on Jan. 25, 2007 at Starr Rink.

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