From Los Angeles Loyolan
By Jesus Lara
As the curtains of their regular season draw to a close, LMU Ice Hockey is looking forward to a busy postseason. The Lions’ Division II team — who competes in both DII and Division III athletics, with a respective team for each division — is currently ranked second in the American Collegiate Hockey Association (ACHA) West and third in the West Coast Hockey Conference (WCHC). With their final regular season game — and senior night — set for Saturday, Feb. 1 against crosstown rival UCLA, they have begun to look forward to the postseason.
“We all had really high expectations for this year, so even being in second — I don’t think any of us are fully satisfied with that,” said defense Foster Krueger. “I think we all know that we could potentially be doing better, so … we’re going to be heading into this game with a chip on our shoulder and go at UCLA as hard as we can,” he added.
“Obviously we want to be first, but we had a pretty strong start to our season and we have to keep it going in the playoffs,” said forward Alex Skenderian, who leads the team in assists (31) and ranks second in goals scored (17).
Now, facing an intense postseason with playoff series in both the ACHA West and the WCHC, the Lions are seriously preparing for the battle ahead — especially as they’re aware that for some of them, these next games will be the last ones where they don the crimson and black before they graduate.
“Practice begins to get a little harder. We do a lot of drills that are game-focused and get us ready for specific teams that we know we’ll play like UCLA or NAU [Northern Arizona University] that we know are a little bit more grittier,” said defense Brendan Carney. “Also, understanding that a lot of seniors, a lot of our leaders — it’s their last few games … just putting that in perspective and valuing our practice and valuing these games we have left,” he continued.
“As the end of the season comes for a lot of us seniors, the intensity is ramping up because we know our days are limited,” Krueger said. “We’ll be doing more film, we’ll be practicing later — all the pistons have to be firing properly. We’re picking up the intensity, for sure.”
Additionally, their first-round playoff opponent in the WCHC is likely to be a familiar foe.
“I think it’s pretty much set in stone that we’ll be playing against UCLA in the first round of the playoffs,” said Krueger. “So, I think that’s actually going to be a pretty tough matchup because it’s three games against the same opponent in a row,” he added. In their last matchup with the Bruins on Saturday, Jan. 25, the Lions lost, 4-5, setting the stage for a showdown between the Los Angeles competitors over the coming weeks.
The DII LMU Ice Hockey team will play their final game of the regular season on Saturday, Feb. 1 at the Toyota Sports Center in El Segundo, California at 2:30 p.m. Admission is free for students and faculty, and the first 300 to arrive receive a free special edition Iggy bobblehead.
“Those games get emotional; they’re our crosstown rival, we know the guys over a few years of playing, so it gets pretty heated. [The game] should be a good battle and a good time,” said Carney.
(Originally published at https://www.laloyolan.com/sports/lmu-ice-hockey-looks-forward-to-busy-postseason/article_d21794d2-4853-56c3-b654-174e2bb23673.html)
