ECRHA Division III Regionals Preview
Loyola, Delaware, Scranton, Cortland, Syracuse
ECRHA February 16th, 2009 at 3:21PM February 16th, 2009 7:34PM
Cockeysville, MD - The ECRHA is proud to announce the schedule for the 2008-2009 Division III Regional Championship. The tournament will be held this weekend at the Sportsplex in Feasterville, PA. The tournament will be the first of its kind in league history and should provide many exciting games during the course of the weekend.
Cortland and Syracuse will kick of the action with the play-in game for the Championship Bracket. Cortland used a natural hat trick by Michael Barbarianrz, including two in the second period to lead Cortland to a 5-2 victory. The winner of the contest will move to the quarterfinals against the top seeded Loyola Greyhounds.
Loyola, by virtue of winning the regular season championship with a record of 9-3 attained the top seed to the tournament and will see the play-in winner in their first game of the tournament.
The other quarterfinal match-up will pit the second seed Delaware Blue Hens against the third seeded Scranton Royals. The teams are quite familiar with one another, playing four time throughout the season. Second seeded Delaware holds the lead in the season series, winning two and tying two others. In the most recent meeting, Gerard Gallo scored two power play goals, including the game tying goal with 1:04 remaining in the third period to lift Delaware to a 4-4 tie.
The winners of both quarterfinals will advance to the semifinal at 5pm on Saturday night with a chance to earn a spot in the championship game on Sunday.The loser of the play-in game will play the loser of the 2/3 quarterfinal at 12pm on Saturday.
The Championship game will be at 12:15pm on Sunday on rink 3. The game will feature the Champion of the Winners Bracket versus the Champion of the Play-Back Bracket in a single game Championship for the Division III crown.