Liberty Flames D2 hockey win puts them back on top

The Liberty University men’s Division II hockey team beat the Virginia Tech Hokies 5-3 Saturday, Nov. 3. The game marked a great ending to the weekend series against Tech, flipping the score for the Flames, who had lost 5-3 the night before.

“Tonight’s game went a lot better than last night’s game,” Liberty forward freshman Jeremy Martin said. “We played hard and started to hit more, play tougher, just got the puck moving, so we played a lot better than we did last night. I think overall, it was a good split on the weekend.”

Friday night’s match ended a seven-game winning streak for the Flames, but Saturday’s win puts them back on track.

“I think the game (Friday night) went really well,” freshman forward DJ Dinnison said. I believe that we used our systems very well — it’s just getting the puck deep. We were putting the puck on net, which gave us opportunities to score, so overall, tonight was good in that sense.”

The game started out a bit slow, but the Flames came through with a goal nine minutes into the first period by senior Brad Docksteader off a pass from freshman Jeff Boschman. The score remained 1-0 at the end of the first period.

Five minutes into the second period, a Hokie goal knotted the game 1-1. Later, the Flames were back in the lead because of an intense hit from Dinnison. No more goals were scored in this period, but the Flames kept the score in the third period.

Senior Caleb Allison brought the score to 3-1 four minutes into the third. Another intense goal was scored for the Flames by Boschman, bringing the score to 4-1. Two more goals were scored by the Hokies, but it was Allison who made the final goal in the last 15 seconds, concluding the game with a 5-3 win.

The season has been a very successful one for Liberty’s D2 hockey, with a record of 10 wins and three losses.

“I think a lot of people at the beginning of the season … didn’t expect us to do as well as we are,” Martin said. “I’m very happy with the way the seasons going. Obviously, you want to win as many games as possible, and seven and one is definitely not bad for now.”

“This year is going really well,” Dinnison said. “We had our first loss last night, but we bounced back pretty well. We need to just keep going and doing the thing that our coaches preach, which is shoot the puck and work hard. If we keep doing that, I think we’ll be successful and have a good rest of the year. We’ll finish out strong.”

The Flames continue their season when they travel to Temple University in Philadelphia Friday, Nov. 9.