ASU Hockey: Five takeaways from victories over UAF

ASU hockey opened their season at home with a pair of wins against the University of Alaska-Fairbanks Nanooks. Here are five quick takeaways from Arizona State’s first weekend on the ice.

Starting Hot

For the first time at the NCAA level, Sun Devil Hockey closed out the first weekend of the season with a 2-0 record.

This does not mean that Arizona State is automatically a lock for the NCAA tournament, but it is a sign of things to come. Not only did the Sun Devils win both games, the Sun Devils dominated the Nanooks across the stat sheet.

With a big matchup against No. 1 Ohio State coming up, two high-scoring wins to start the season could prove to have a huge impact in the Sun Devils’ locker room going forward.

Goals, Goals, Goals

In the two games, the Sun Devils scored a total of eight goals, putting the puck in the net three times on Saturday and five times on Sunday.

For a team that was held to one or fewer goals in 14 of their 34 games a season ago, the offense clicking this early into the 2018-19 season is a step in the right direction.

Even more importantly, no player scored more than once either night, with only veteran Johnny Walker and co-captain Brinson Pasichnuk scoring a goal both nights.

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The other four goals were scored by freshman Demetrios Koumontzis, who scored both his first career NCAA goal and the Sun Devils’ first goal of the season, co-captain Tyler Busch, Canadian true freshman P.J. Marrocco, and defenseman Jacob Wilson.

Only Pasichnuk’s two goals were unassisted, allowing netminder Joey Daccord to pick up his third career assist and highly-touted freshman Austin Lemieux to put his name on an NCAA scoresheet for the first time.

Protecting the Net

Joey Daccord, who finished last season with a .910 save percentage and a 3.44 goals allowed average, shined in the spotlight this weekend.

In game one, Daccord stopped all 23 shots he faced, and he kept the 13 he saw on Sunday from crossing the goal line as well. With a shutout in each of the first two games this season, the Ottawa Senators’ prospect now has more shutouts in the first weekend of the 2018-19 season than he had in his previous two seasons with Arizona State.

In addition to Daccord posting back-to-back shutouts, the players in front of him blocked 21 shots over the course of the weekend.

Look Good, Feel Good, Play Good

Sun Devil Hockey joined in on the Adidas uniform craze over the offseason, and they looked comfortable and clean over the weekend. To start off the season, the Sun Devils went with a white helmet, white sweater, maroon pants combination.

For Sunday’s game, Arizona State went with the uniform combo that has been nicknamed the “Tradition” combo: maroon helmet, white sweater, maroon pants.

The Sun Devils have four different helmets and two different jerseys, allowing for eight different combinations to pair with the team’s classic maroon pants.

Bringing out the Brooms

The season opening victories not only gave the Sun Devils their first 2-0 start in program history, but it was also the first home sweep for the team at the NCAA level.

Although the schedule becomes nothing but more difficult, the Sun Devils will have six more opportunities this season to pick up more home sweeps.