Men's Hockey 2/8/03 -- St. Thomas 5, Augsburg 2 

BOXSCORE

ST. PAUL, Minn. (2/8/03) -- The University St. Thomas men's hockey team raced to a 5-0 lead in the first 26 minutes and came away with a 5-2 victory over visiting Augsburg College in Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference play Saturday night at the Fairgrounds Coliseum ice.

The win avenged UST's 4-2 loss at Augsburg Friday night and let the Toms clinch a top-two MIAC finish.

Freshman Dan Krmpotich (Fr., Eden Prairie, Minn.) scored his first two goals of the season to stake the Toms to a 2-0 lead. Dustan Lick (So., Eagan, Minn.) added two goals; Anthony Blumer (So., Eagan, Minn./St. Thomas Academy) and Bryan Skrypek (Sr., Little Canada, Minn./Roseville HS) each had two assists; and goalie Bob Tallarico (Sr., St. Paul, Minn./Henry Sibley HS) stopped 22 of 24 shots for St. Thomas (15-6-2 overall, 10-3-1 MIAC).

Brad Schwartzbauer (Sr., White Bear Lake, Minn.) and David May (So., Burnsville, Minn.) scored third-period goals for Augsburg (15-8 overall, 10-6 MIAC), which finished its conference season locked into third place. Augsburg's Erik Young (So., White Bear Lake, Minn.) stopped all 18 shots he faced in the final 33:54 in relief of starter Pete Samargia (Sr., Gilbert, Minn./Eveleth-Gilbert HS), who held the Toms to two goals in Friday's game but stopped just 16 of 21 Saturday night.

The Tommie win, coupled with St. John's 6-5 home loss Saturday to ninth-place Bethel, pulls the Toms (21 points) within two points of the first-place Johnnies (11-2-1, 23 points) heading into next week's showdown series. UST and SJU play Thursday night at St. Cloud State and Friday night at the Coliseum. A win and a tie would let UST share the MIAC championship, and two wins will give the Toms the title outright.

If the Johnnies get a split, sweep or two ties, they win the title and the No. 1 playoff seed and drop the Toms into the No. 2 seed for the Feb. 27-28 and March 1 playoffs at Bloomington Ice Garden. That would mean a Tommie-Auggie semifinal game Feb. 28.

Augsburg has completed its conference play; it has a two-game nonconference series to close the regular season at Northland College in Ashland, Wis., on Friday (2/14) at 7 p.m. and Saturday (2/15) at 2 p.m.

Augsburg-----0/0/2--2
St. Thomas---3/2/0--5

1st period
1, ST-Dan Krmpotich (Adam Cozine, T.J. Renskers) 4:51; 2, ST-D. Krmpotich (Joe Krmpotich, Brandon Wilcox) 14:43; 3, Dustan Lick (Andrew Campbell, Anthony Blumer) 15:14.
2nd period
4, David DuBord (Bryan Skrypek, Drew Palmgren) 3:42 pp; 5, ST-Lick (Blumer, Skrypek) 6:06.
3rd period
6, Aug-Brad Schwartzbauer (Brady Fougner, Jaro Cesky) 5:17 pp; 7, Aug-David May (David Nelson, Collin Nash) 9:13.

Goalies
Aug--Pete Samargia, 26:06, 5 GA, 16 saves (13-3-x); Erik Young 33:54, 0 GA, 18 saves (x-10-8).