Western New England Tops Endicott 10-7 in Battle of CCC Unbeatens

Golden Bears use 4-0 run early in fourth quarter to take control

SPRINGFIELD, Mass. (April 13, 2019) – In a battle of the last two remaining unbeaten teams in Commonwealth Coast Conference (CCC) play, Western New England University used a strong fourth quarter effort to top Endicott College, 10-7, on Saturday afternoon at Golden Bear Stadium.

Top Performers
Senior Hunter Cocks (Walden, N.Y.) and sophomore Jared Newall (Stratford, Conn.) scored two goals each for the Golden Bears, while freshman Mike Bannon (Edmond, Okla.) finished with one goal and two assists. Cocks also won 11-of-20 faceoffs and scooped up seven ground balls.

Senior Tim Breau (Lima, N.Y.) helped facilitate the offense with three assists, and sophomore Matt Greer (South Windsor, Conn.) set up a pair of goals.
 
Junior Sean McCusker (Northport, N.Y.) was solid in the cage, making 11 saves on the 18 shots he faced.

Endicott juniors Will Clark (Burnt Hills, N.Y.) and Nick Arcadipane (Groveland, Mass.) both scored a pair of goals to pace the Gulls offensively.

Game Review
Endicott opened the scoring just over two minutes into the contest, as junior Andrew Soucy (Andover, Mass.) found classmate Neal Parry (Marshfield, Mass.) to get the Gulls on the board.

After Arcadipane tallied an unassisted goal at the 10:27 mark, the Golden Bears broke through with 7:35 left in the opening frame as Bannon set up Newall to make it 2-1. Late in the quarter, junior John Shahpazian (New Providence, N.J.) scored a man-up goal on a feed from Breau to tie the contest.

The Gulls restored their two-score advantage (4-2) with goals from Soucy (9:54) and Clark (6:29) in the second quarter. Cocks won the ensuing faceoff following the Clark goal and buried his first of the game at the 6:18 mark, and the Golden Bears trailed by the same margin (4-3) at halftime.

The defensive battle continued in the third quarter, as Bannon scored the only goal of the frame at the 14:16 mark to tie the score yet again.

Western New England took control of the contest with a 4-0 surge over the first 3:13 of the fourth quarter. Cocks won the opening faceoff of the frame and took the ball down the field before firing a shot past Endicott senior goalie Patrick Dean (Westhampton, N.Y.) to put the Golden Bears in front for the first time, 5-4.

Freshman Noah Rust (Windham, N.H.) scored 49 seconds later, before senior Joe Holleran (Pittsburgh, Pa.) and freshman Murphy Hartmann (Anthem, Ariz.) followed with goals at 12:54 and 11:47, respectively, to increase Western New England's advantage to 8-4.

Clark scored an unassisted goal with 11:13 on the clock to end the Western New England run, but the Golden Bears used a man-up goal from Ward with 6:49 to play to push the lead back to four (9-5).

Endicott responded with a goal from Arcadipane 28 seconds later, and junior Ben Clark (Burnt Hills, N.Y.) found the back of the net with 3:16 remaining to get the Gulls back to within two (9-7), but they would get no closer.

The Western New England defense kept Endicott off the board the rest of the way, and Newall scored his second of the game with 1:34 remaining to extend the final margin to three.

Notes
• Western New England outshot Endicott 44-39, including 15-8 in the decisive fourth quarter.
• The Golden Bears, who went a perfect 18-for-18 on clear attempts, improve to 14-10 in 24 all-time meetings with the Gulls.

Up Next
Both teams will be back in action on Tuesday night, as Western New England (9-4, 6-0 CCC) travels to Curry and Endicott (6-7, 4-1 CCC) returns home to take on Roger Williams.