Falcons fall to Sacred Heart, 4-1

FAIRFIELD, Conn. – Sacred Heart took game one of a best-of-three Atlantic Hockey quarterfinal series, with a 4-1 win over Air Force, Friday, March 7, at Martire Family Arena in Fairfield, Conn.

Game two of the quarterfinal series is Saturday, March 8, at 5:05 pm ET in Fairfield, Conn.

Sacred Heart (20-10-5) opened the scoring just 4:02 into the game as Tyler Ghiradosi redirected a shot by John Driscoll. Late in the period, the Falcons tied the game. Nolan Cunningham's shot bounced hard off the back wall and Austin Schwartz's shot was saved, but the puck snuck behind the Pioneer goalie. Freshman Anthony Yu was there to tuck it in with 1:16 left in the first.

With the double overtime game-winner last Saturday night, Yu has scored Air Force's last two goals. Cunningham has eight points (2-6-8) in his last eight games while Schwartz has six points (3-3-6) in his last five.

The Pioneers scored twice in the first seven minutes of the second period for a 3-1 lead. Pioneer John Jaworski gave the home team a 2-1 lead at 4:14 on the rush with a wrister from a sharp angle on the right side. Just over three minutes later, SHU took a 3-1 lead on a 2-on-1 rush. Matthew Guerra set up Max Dorrington for his 12^th goal of the season at 6:54.

With 3:15 left in the third, Air Force (15-20-3) pulled the goalie for the extra attacker. With 13 seconds left, Ghiradosi scored an empty-netter to seal the 4-1 win.

"They did a better job of putting the puck in the net than we did," head coach Frank Serratore said. "We were chasing the scoreboard again. We had some good looks and we held our own territorially. We will come back tomorrow and we need to do a better job of finding the back of the net."

Air Force outshot SHU, 30-23, in the game. Air Force was 0-for-3 on the power play and killed SHU's only power-play attempt. Guy Blessing made 19 saves. SHU freshman Ajeet Gundarah made 29 for the Pioneers.

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Team Stats

Anthony Yu

Nolan Cunningham

Austin Schwartz

Mason McCormick

Players Mentioned

Guy Blessing

Nolan Cunningham

Austin Schwartz

Anthony Yu

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