Senior co-captain Todd Bennett recorded his first two-goal game of the season as Quinnipiac cruised to a 5-2 win over Bentley on Tuesday night at the Northford Ice Pavilion.
With the victory, Quinnipiac clinched home ice for the quarterfinal round of the MAAC playoffs. A win on Saturday in the regular-season finale against Connecticut would assure itself of the No. 2 seed.
The victory also served as a milestone for head coach Rand Pecknold, who tied Jim Armstrong for tops on the school’s all-time win list with 140. Pecknold’s record in his eight seasons with the club is 140-76-21.
Quinnipiac opened the scoring at 2:06 of the first period on a goal from Ryan Morton. Neil Breen won a faceoff in the left circle and slid it over to Morton, who snapped a shot through the legs of Kevin Williams.
The host doubled its lead at 11:22 when Matt Craig fired a shot from between the circles that found the back of the net.
Bennett struck for his first of two tallies less than two minutes later,
wristing a feed from Matt Erhart home on a shot from the left circle. Brian Herbert was also credited with an assist on the score.
The Falcons got on the board with 1:06 remaining in the frame. Steve Tobio warded off a QU defender and lifted a backhander over Justin Eddy to cut the lead to 3-1.
Quinnipiac put the game away with two second period goals. Ryan Olson’s spin-a-rama from the top of the left circle beat Williams at 7:17.
Later in the period, Bennett capped of a 2-on-1 rush, finishing off a pass from Herbert and depositing it into the back of the cage.
Bentley answered just 62 seconds later, as Tobio’s knuckler from the right point made it through a screen and past Eddy.
Along with Bennett, Herbert, Olson and White also finished with two-point nights. Eddy stopped 34 of 36 shots on the evening and is now unbeaten in his last four starts (3-0-1).
Prior to Friday’s game with UConn, the team will honor its six seniors —
Bennett, Ben Blais, Breen, Mike LaRocca, Olson and Matt Plante. The group is the first to play their entire careers exclusively at the Division I level.
Game time is set for 7 p.m at the Northford Ice Pavilion on Friday night.
