Denver will be without freshman defenseman Chris Butler and sophomore forward Geoff Paukovich during the Dec. 30-31 Denver Cup, and a third player, versatile junior Adrian Veideman, is questionable with a shoulder injury.
The Pioneers (11-7-2), who head into Christmas break ranked No. 12 in the USA Today/USA Hockey Magazine poll, don’t expect to garner any sympathy from Boston College. The No. 4 Eagles (9-4-1), who open the Denver Cup against Ferris State (8-6-2), will be without three of their best players during the 14th holiday tournament.
Freshman forward Nathan Gerbe and sophomore goalie Cory Schneider have become U.S. National Junior Team teammates with Butler and Paukovich, and BC sophomore Dan Bertram will play for the Canadian 20-under team during the World Junior Championship that starts Monday in British Columbia.
Bertram and Gerbe are second and fourth on their team in scoring, and Schneider is the only goalie the Eagles have used this season. Schneider, who also played for the U.S. team last year, has a 2.28 goals-against average and .911 saves percentage.
“Any program that has quality players, you know you run the risk of losing them because of, a) tournaments like this; or b) to professional careers,” said DU coach George Gwozdecky, whose team opens the Denver Cup against Princeton (4-10). “That’s the fine balancing act you have to do. You want to have those kind of players, but it’s a risk-versus-reward type of thing.”
Turning the corner
Denver has won six of its past seven games, and goalies Glenn Fisher and Peter Mannino have not allowed more than two non-empty-net goals in the Pioneers’ past eight games.
“We have been getting better,” Gwozdecky said on the heels of last weekend’s 4-2 and 3-1 victories at Minnesota-Duluth. “I’ve seen real progress from the beginning of the season, when we definitely weren’t the team that we are now.”
Footnotes
BC’s Bertram is one of four NCAA players to be selected for Canada’s World Junior team, the most since Canada had DU’s Matt Pettinger and Wisconsin’s Dany Heatley on its 1999 team. … Colorado College winger Aaron Slattengren was named Western Collegiate Hockey Association offensive player of the week, and DU defenseman Matt Carle earned the defensive honor. Slattengren had three goals and six points in the Tigers’ two-game sweep at Alaska-Anchorage last weekend. Carle had the game-winning goal in last Friday’s 4-2 win at Minnesota-Duluth and added three assists in the series. Carle, attempting to become DU’s first Hobey Baker Award winner, spearheaded a defense that gave up just three goals last weekend and blanked the Bulldogs on 12 power-play opportunities.
Mike Chambers can be reached at 303-820-5453 or mchambers@denverpost.com.
