Lancers Drop Season Opener & Woo Cup Tournament Game To Anna Maria

Worcester, MA- The Worcester State Lancers Men's Ice Hockey team opened up their season tonight vs. the Anna Maria AMCATS in the yearly "Woo Cup" tournament hosted by the AMCATS at the Worcester Ice Center.

The Woo Cup is comprised of four schools, Worcester St., Nichols, Assumption, and Anna Maria. Nichols has taken the cup home the last two years as back-to-back tournament winners.

FINAL:

Lancers 3

Anna Maria 5

Sophomore forward Anders Grongstad (Royal Oak, Mich.) scored the first goal of the season on a power play unassisted to put the Lancers up 1-0 in their season opener early into the second period. 

Anna Maria would equalize the score roughly eight minutes later with a short-handed goal from Matt Gilbert 10:43 into the second, the score now 1-1. 

The Lancers would answer with a second power-play goal of their own 13:22 into the second period by first-year forward Michael Schaaf, assisted by forward graduate student Brendan Ronan (Saugus, Mass.). The score is now 2-1. 

Senior forward Brian Clougherty (Lynn, Mass.) netted the team's third power-play goal of the night just seconds after their previous goal to put the Lancers up 3-1 in the first game of the Woo Cup. 

Anna Maria would go on a major run of answered goals in the third period. AMCAT Brandon Della Paolera cut the lead to 3-2 on a power play. The goal was assisted by Matt Byrne and Guillarme Coulumbe. 

Della Paolera would score again 7:06 into the third period to tie the score at 3-3.

Thirty seconds would pass until Anna Maria's Pearce Baker would find the back of the net to give the AMCATS their first lead of the night, 4-3, 7:43 into the third. 

Anna Maria added an insurance goal, this time from Nicholas Frederick to complete the comeback and advance his team to the championship round of the Woo Cup. 

With the loss, the Lancers drop to (0-1, 0-0 MASCAC) while Anna Maria improves to (1-0, 0-0 GNAC).

The next game for the team will be the Woo Cup's consolation game Sunday vs Nichols College, October 29th at a 3:40pm.