DIII hockey ends season in ACHA semifinals against Hope College
Central Michigan Division III hockey didn't expect its season to end this way.
After the team won against Air Force 6-3 Thursday in a slow, but strong finish. The Chippewas went head to head against Hope College and lost 7-5 to end their season.
The momentum from the Air Force game was not apparent when the Chippewas took to the ice against Hope College.
In the opening period, Hope got off to a 3-0 start.
In the next period, CMU answered with three of their own goals, tying the game and heading into the last period with a chance to make it to the ACHA Championship game.
Both Hope and CMU scored within the first 30 seconds of play. Allgaier scored his 11th goal of the postseason about four minutes later, giving the Chippewas their first lead of the game at 5-4.
Despite the effort from CMU, the Flying Dutchmen scored three unanswered goals and advanced to the championship game against Oakland University.
When Allgaier’s goal came at 16:27, the Chippewas couldn’t build on their lead Sutherland said.
“We tried to make a push and get some goals, but nothing was going for us,” he said. “Sometimes it happens in hockey, and unfortunately we were a part of it.”
The Chippewas' season goal was to win the championship game, but this loss hurts, Sutherland said.
“It was really emotional after the game with everyone upset and just sad,” he said. “It didn’t feel real.”
In the matchup between both of these teams, a similar situation took place earlier in the season on Oct. 21.
“The last time we played Hope, were up, but they scored a goal, started talking, started to get under our skin and (we were) unfocused on winning the game,” Allgaier said. “We ended up losing that game and that’s what happened today too.”
CMU might’ve received Hope's best game, but CMU was ultimately responsible for what happened, Allgaier said.
“They played well, but we could have played way better,” he said.
“The end goal was to go to the national championship and win it all, so the individual stats don’t necessarily matter,” Allgaier said. “Looking back in five, 10, 15 years, it’d be nice to say I did both, but I’d rather have the team goal above all else.”
Allgaier said despite the final result, the team’s effort wasn’t all for nothing.
“I think we set the program up into a nice position to tell people who we are now and that it’s not a joke to play here, that we’re kind of serious,” he said. “Hopefully it gets better in the years to come and we can build more onto the program from here.”
CMU ends their hockey season with a final record of 37-7. The Chippewas are Michigan Collegiate Hockey Association Conference Vezina Cup Champions.
