Dayton (OH) - September 25-26, 2009 - With back-to-back wins 5-4 and 6-3 over cross town rival Wright State, the Flyers secured the Dayton Cup. The team is pictured after Saturday's clincher.

Sunday afternoon’s game was a little closer than the Flyers would have liked. The Flyers netted the first goal of the game when Freshman Andrew Freund let his patented wrist shot go from the top of the left circle, beating the Tiger goalie high to the glove side.  The Tigers quickly tied the score at one. Shortly after the Tigers scored, Seniors Connor “Buff” Hourihan and Chris Ambrose hooked up for one of their classic goals. Hourihan dug the puck off the left wing boards and found Ambrose who took the perfect pass from Hourihan and one-timed the puck past the Tiger netminder.  Just after that, Junior Ryan Grande and Senior Ryan O’Keefe hooked up for another goal. O’keefe took the puck from the right side ans dished it to Grande who walked in and fired a slapshot that beat the RIT goalie.  The Tigers battled back again to tie the score at 3.With time winding down in the game, John Lucas, Chris Ambrose and John Markwell hooked up for another highlight reel goal. Lucas hit Ambrose on a perfect cross ice breakout pass and Ambrose found Markwell, who had managed to sneak behind the Tiger defense, with a tape-to-tape pass at the Tigers' blue line. Marwell went in alone on the Tiger goalie and pulled a beautiful backhand move and scored the game winner with only 18 seconds left. That goal would stand to be the game winner as Junior goalie Nick Marcucci stood on his head again, making sure his Flyers won the game.

Kettering (OH) - February 9, 2009 - In a rare Monday night matchup, the Flyers took to the ice against cross-town rivals Wright State in a game that would determine the winner of this year’s Gem City Challenge Cup. As always, the game was intense. With big hits and a myriad of goals, the fans were not disappointed.

The Flyers opened up the scoring in the first when freshman forward Nick Fosheim hit his linemate and fellow freshman Drew Jolley on a beautiful pass that ended with Jolley burying the puck behind the Wright State goalie. But, as usual, Wright State did not let up, they quickly tied the score at 1-1 from a shot in the shot that beat Flyer goalie Nick Marcucci. The start of the second period got off to a good start for the Flyers when Mattison “Natasha-Simone Lahood” Murphy and senior Chris Ambrose found themselves on a two on one. Murphy hit Ambrose with a great back hand saucer pass and Ambrose buried the puck low to the glove side. Shortly thereafter, Ambrose blocked a shot from a Wright State defenseman and went in on a breakaway. He let a slap shot go from the top of the circle which beat the goalie high to the glove side. The Wright State coaches had seen enough, Ambrose’s second of the night chased the tender from the net. Wright State however fought back and made it a close game. Wright State, as they are accustomed to doing, began to take bad penalties which led to another Flyer goal. Sophomore John Lucas hooked up with Senior Connor “Buff” Hourihan for a power-play goal.

In the third period, Wright State took it to the flyers for a short period of time. Midway through the third, Wright State battled back and was inching closer to tying the Flyers. With Wright State trailing by only one, Senior Brett Davies maneuvered his way in the high slot and let a snap shot go, beating the goalie and giving the Flyers a two goal lead.

At the end of the game, Nick Marcucci stood tall in net and was able to withstand a late third period onslaught by Wright State. The game was capped off when Drew Jolley hit Ambrose who buried the puck into the empty net for a hat trick. With the final score of 7-5 and securing the win, that put the season series tied at 1-1.

The Flyers look to build on the win next weekend hosting two home games against Rochester Institute of Technology, and then will go on to finish the season with a home and home series against Toledo.

Northbrook (IL) - February 6/7, 2009 - Dayton traveled to Chicago for a two game set against the highly ranked DePaul University hockey club. In what was a bittersweet homecoming for veteran players Clint Davis and Nick Marcucci, the Flyers dropped both games in valiant efforts. The first game ended in a final score of 9-3 despite a great early effort that saw the Dayton squad skating circles around the home team, but leaving too many odd man breaks for the netminder to handle. The second game of the series saw much of the same in a penalty ridden affair with a final score of 4-1. Injuries, disqualifications and travel legs all contributed to the loss, but yet again the potent DePaul powerplay was the Achilles heel of the Flyer club resulting in half the goals against as they mastered the cross-crease pass to find the net from the back door.

Champaign (IL) - October 24/25, 2008 - The Flyers took to the road for the weekend to play two road games against the 8-1 Illini. Both games were close contests with each team coming out on top once. In Friday’s game, the Flyers took an early 1-0 lead when Senior forward John Markwell pressured the Illini defenseman and forced him to turn over the puck behind his net. Markwell was able to use the large Illinois ice surface to go straight to the net for a wrap-around goal. The Flyers held the slim lead until midway through the third period when the Illini scored on a slap shot from the top of the circles. The Illini were able to gain momentum and score another goal just a few minutes later on an odd man rush. The Flyers pushed to tie the game late in the third but the Illini tender game up with some big saves to preserve the victory for his team. The PIM leader goes to Ryan (KILLER) O’Keefe who was thrown out of the game on a controversial scrum.

In Saturday's contest, the fortunes were reversed. The Flyers dominated the early play but the Illini scored first. The Flyers were able to tie the contest on nice deflection goal by Freshman Andrew Freund, the first goal of his young UD Hockey career. The main assist went to Brett Anton who made the deflection possible with a nice low shot from the point. The tie lasted until late in the second period when a defensive breakdown by the Flyers let an Illini forward score from the top of the circles on Rookie tender Kyle Freuck. The Flyers saw themselves as the underdogs going into the third.

A key factor that influences a team is HEART and the Flyers definitely don’t lack that. The Flyers senior forwards lead by example in the third when John Markwell and Chris “Tuzzi” Ambrose hooked up for a Sportscenter highlight goal. Markwell was able to hit Ambrose with a “Sick Sauce” pass across the ice to put Ambrose in on a one-on-one. Ambrose didn’t let the opportunity pass as he made nice move then went bar down on the Illini goalie who “didn’t know whether to cry or wind his watch” (The infamous Penguin announcer Mike Lange).

The score stayed tied through regulation and a five minute overtime. Then came the most exciting aspect of the hockey….the shootout. The trend continued as the score stayed tied after the first three shooters 1-1 as Flyer Conner “Buffalo” Hourihan went bar down on the Illini tender. The shootout went to the sixth round and Anthony “Bella” Sirabella scored what proved to be the winning goal for the Flyers. Bella went to his go to move and looked to be stopped but was able to muscle the puck through the five hole. Freshman goalie Kyle Freuck stopped the last shooter to claim the victory for the Flyers. The Flyers rushed the ice to celebrate their first 'W' of the season. As assistant coach Tony Vogt said “every streak started with 1 win”.

The Flyers will host the EKU Colonels next weekend for two contests. Come out and support your team – Friday 10/31 at 9:30 PM and Saturday 11/1 at 5:00 PM. at the Kettering Rec Center.

Dayton (OH) - September 26, 2008 - After a spirited period of hockey that resulted in a 1-1 tie with Wright State, Zamboni problems at Hara Arena forced the game to be postponed. No date has been set to complete the game.

Dayton (OH) - August 8, 2008 - All UD Flyer Hockey Alumni are invited to participte in this year's Alumni game scheduled to be played October 18, 2008 at 3:30 PM at the Kettering Rec Center. Immediately following the Alumni Game, this year's squad will take on Indiana University at 5:00 PM. Click here for more details.

If not for top tier officiating accustomed to the more physical nature of the game, this one could have gotten even uglier than it did as starting netminder Nick Marcucci had to leave the game in the 3rd on a stretcher, taken to a local hospital for a severe knee injury, after a BGSU player took a tumble into his pads after the whistle. That let loose a flurry of already excessive anger that resulted with no less than 5 fighting majors and game disqualifications (3 BGSU, 2 UD).

The more than 130 minutes in penalties were the obvious highlight but somewhere in the midst of that action UD won the game 3-2 thanks to a late powerplay following the jump from behind by a BGSU player on Flyer Austin Thornton that resulted in a major penalty and game ejection giving UD 5 minutes to find the net. Jared Ostrander scored the game winner with a karma-induced helper from Thornton. UD outshot BGSU 41-28 with Vinny Barsanti fielding the last 2 shots after Marcucci left the game due to injury.

Kettering (OH) - Nov 9/10, 2007 - Friday night's game found the UD team finding the net fast and often against Illinois. Highlights included chasing the starting Illinois netminder before the mid-way point of the game after surrendering 7 goals and seeing several UD players with a shot at a hat trick going into the 3rd period. The final score in the win over Illinois was 11-4. The Flyers dominated the first 2 ˝ periods of play, but surrendered 2 late goals in the 3rd to give the Illini a sniff of hope for the Saturday afternoon game. The game winning goal went to Bobby Block and the winning goaltender was Vinnie Barsanti who made 22 saves on 26 shots. Top scorer for the game was Adam Burgess with 2 goals and 3 assists and top PIM honors went to John Markwell with 12 minutes feeling shame.

With their bus legs gone and building on Friday's strong finish, the Illini came out firing on all cylinders in Saturday's game as the UD team seemed to have already presumed victory before ever stepping on the ice. At the end of the first period the teams were locked in what looked to be a defensive game 0-0 with shots nearly even at 8-6 favoring the Flyers.

Once awakened from their slumber with a stirring discussion between periods, the Flyers went on the aggressive forecheck and peppered the Illinois goaltender with 15 shots in the 2nd, but with different results than a night previous. The Illini, fighting a short bench, looked to stretch the ice with long fast break passes which worked well enough give them the lead 2-1 at the end of 2. Dayton's lone goal came on a short-handed effort from Jared Ostrander compliments of Connor Hourihan.

The 3rd period began with Dayton on the power play and answering the call with Marc Sease's power play goal only 30 seconds in to tie the game. Scotty Baird gave Dayton the lead at the midpoint of the final period with another shorthanded goal only to see Illinois tie it up a short time later on the same power play while John Bok sat in the sin bin for 2 of his game leading 18 PIM's.

The result was a game much closer than it should have been as the Flyers out shot the Illini 38-20. Both teams battled it out neck and neck the entire way only to end in a 3-3 tie at the end of regulation. Due to time constraints, a 5 minute overtime period was not played and the game ended with a shootout, which the Flyers lost 2-0, resulting in a 4-3 loss.

After an inspiring pre-game lecture from Coach Gruhly, Saturday saw a completely different Dayton team who came out with a score to settle. This game was driven by two high-powered offenses with a back and forth battle keeping the scores within 1 goal most of the way. The team played with great intensity, driven by trying to pull one out for injured teammate Bobby Block who was taken by stretcher to a nearby hospital in the second period after being the target of a major boarding penalty (he was released later that evening diagnosed with mild concussion and compressed spine). The score at the end of regulation was 7-7 due in large part to the coach's hat trick (4 goals) for hometown favorite Marc Sease who put on a scoring clinic against the Lindenwood netminder and thanks to the last minute heroics of John Markwell who sustained a fractured rib for his efforts in tying the game to head to OT where it still could not be decided and the Flyers had to kill a penalty. Despite the valiant attempt to defeat their opponent as a win for their fallen teammate, the game could not be won on emotion alone as Lindenwood prevailed in a heartbreaking shootout 2-1.

The Flyers will be at home this weekend taking on the University of Illinois for the hockey parents' weekend on Friday at 9:40 pm and Saturday at 5:30 pm at Kettering Rec Center.

Check back next week for a recap on the game and the first of our player profile spotlights.