Army West Point hockey (7-17-1 overall, 5-12-1 Atlantic Hockey) defeated its international rival Royal Military College of Canada, 6-1, on Jan. 28 at Tate Rink.
Winning the 85th meeting between the two schools, Army took back the Challenge Trophy as the Black Knights improved to 48-30-7 all-time in the series and 10-1-1 under head coach Brian Riley.Army dominated the first period, holding the Paladins to zero shots on goal through the opening 20 minutes.The scoring was opened with a power-play goal from John Driscoll at the 4:25 mark, with Pierce Patterson providing the helper. RMC continued to take penalties, allowing Army to deposit another goal on the man-advantage midway through the period as Vincent Salice beat Michael Davis in the Paladins' net as Patterson logged his second power-play helper of the game.While Army was on its third power-play later in the period, RMC took yet another penalty while on the kill to give the Black Knights over a minute with a five-on-three advantage. With just a few seconds left two-men up, Ricky Lyle redirected a Mac Gadowsky shot from in close to give the Black Knights a third special teams goal of the period as Army fired 18 shots on goals in the opening period to lead 3-0.After creating no chances in the first 20 minutes, RMC got on the board in the first minute of the second period, with Austin Saint getting the tip-in goal off a shot from Devin Pimm. This time it was RMC who got a pair of power-play chances in the period with the opportunity to make it a one-goal game. The Army penalty kill and Gavin Abric held firm, as Abric made 15 stops in the second period alone.Getting back to even strength, Lucas Kanta did well to keep the puck in Army's offensive zone before Hunter McCoy fed Stephen Willey who restored the three-goal lead with 5:41 to play in the period. After taking the 4-1 lead into the third, Gadowsky lit the lamp for another even strength tally for Army at 6:48 into the frame.Abric was up to the task of stopping RMC's seven shots in the final 20 minutes, as Willey added one more in the final minute for his second of the contest as Army prevailed by a score of 6-1 in front of 2,365 fans at Tate Rink.Army will head to Princeton for its final non-conference affair on the schedule at 7 p.m. Jan. 30 on ESPN+.