By
Chris Suffecool
Arizona Daily Wildcat
Hope for positive showing at tournament in Iceland
The Arizona Icecats routed Northern State University this past weekend to remain undefeated at the Tucson Convention Center this season.
The Icecats (9-1 overall) dominated the Wolves (2-6) during both outings, winning Friday night's game 12-1 and Saturday night's contest, 11-1.
For the Icecats, another homestand became another pair of easy victories. The Icecats have not lost a home game this season and have not dropped a game since October 22nd.
Senior forward Marc Harris, who had a hat trick Saturday night, said that his team has established a positive pattern.
"The way things are going, it is getting kind of routine," Harris said. "It's a nice routine. It's much more fun to win both instead of splitting like we did the first (two) games of the season (against Saint Louis University)."
The Icecats will attempt to carry their positive momentum to Iceland, where the Icecats will compete tomorrow through Sunday.
The Icecats left early yesterday morning for the Fire and Ice Saga Tournament, which will be played in both Reykjavic and Akureyri, Iceland.
UA will begin play tomorrow in the ten-team tournament. Arizona will play four games in their five-team bracket. The winners of the two brackets will face each other in the championship game.
The Icecats will face some interesting competition in their first four games - Oakland University (Michigan), USC, and the Iceland National and Select teams will all compete in UA's bracket.
Senior defender Ty Brush expects his team to perform well in the tournament.
"We're obviously expecting big things out of this tournament," Brush said. "It's getting to the point in the season where you've got to start bearing down and being consistent because you can't just turn it on when nationals come."
Icecats head coach Leo Golembiewski said that Iceland will be a good experience for his team, giving the Icecats a chance to play in a different atmosphere.
"Iceland, of course, is a tremendous opportunity for our kids," he said. "We're going to be playing on an Olympic-size rink. That's going to be tough, obviously - it's wider and it's longer."
In the past five years, UA has played just two games on an Olympic-sized rink.
Golembiewski is hoping that his team will play up to their potential while in Iceland.
"This is a great group of kids," he said. "It's as good a hockey team as we've ever had at Arizona, if not the best. If we can keep them healthy and keep them working hard, maybe it'd be a year to remember from beginning to end."
In the newest ACHA rankings - which came out on last Friday - the Icecats dropped one spot to No. 7.
"It is getting kind of annoying to keep winning games by a lot and drop in the rankings," Harris said. "It's a little frustrating to see us ranked 7th, but I guarantee we'll bounce back up. All we're doing is winning games. That's all we can do right now."
