PITTSBURGH, PA. - On Thursday the Cougars (11-3, 5-1 PAC) took on the Hiram Terriers (6-9, 2-5 PAC) in a game that was supposed to be played on Wednesday at Hiram but Mother Nature had other plans. The Cougars controlled this game from the opening face off, cruising to a 26-4 victory. With the Cougars win today, they have clinched a berth in the PAC Tournament for the second year in a row and the fifth time in program history.

The Cougars opened the game with the PAC leading goal scorer, Thomas Whitaker finding the back of the net first for his 54th goal of the season assisted by Brady Rigdon. Just 30 seconds later, Luke Iovino scored his first goal of the game, ninth of the season, unassisted. Just over a minute later, Tyler Laughlin scored his first goal of the game, seventh of the season, unassisted. Almost a minute and a half later, Brady Rigdon scored his first goal of the game, seventh of the season, unassisted. Jack Neal kept the unassisted goal streak rolling with his first goal of the day, third of the season. Thomas Whitaker ended the Cougars three minute scoring drought with his second goal of the day, 55th of the season, assisted by Adam Rinker. Roughly 30 seconds later, Adam Rinker scored his first goal of the day, 14th of the season, unassisted. Luke Iovino followed with his second goal of the day, 10th of the season, unassisted. Five minutes later, Erik Sahlgren scored his first goal of the game, 11th of the season, assisted by Jacob Lubawy. That ended the first quarter with the Cougars leading 9-0.

In the second quarter, the Cougars continued to roll scoring the first five goals of the quarter. That was started with Thomas Whitaker's third goal of the day, 56th of the season, assisted by Adam Rinker. That was followed by Brady Rigdon scoring his second goal of the day, eighth of the season, assisted by Cody Randal. Two minutes later, Rigdon completed his hat trick with his eighth goal of the season, this time assisted by Adam Rinker. Thomas Whitaker ended the Cougars five minute scoring drought with his fourth goal of the game, 57th of the season, assisted by Sean Creeden. Jacob lubawy scored his first goal of the season, 18th of the season, exactly one minute later assisted by Jack Neal. The Terriers were able to score their first goal of the game just 20 seconds later. The Cougars then continued their dominance, starting with Thomas Whitaker scoring his fifth goal of the day, 58th of the season, assisted by Michael Flynn. Less than a minute later Whitaker was hitting the back of the net for the sixth time in the game, 59th of the season, assisted by Brady Rigdon. Whitaker completed his three goal run with his seventh goal of the day, 60th of the season, assisted by Devin Traister. Before halftime, Sean Creeden scored his first goal of the game, 14th of the season, assisted by Luke Iovino. That gave the Cougars an 18-1 lead heading into halftime.

The Cougars continued rolling in the third quarter with Luke Iovino completing his second career hat trick, 11th goal of the season, assisted by Erik Sahlgren. Thomas Whitaker followed with his eighth goal of the game, tying the single game goals record and his 61st of the season, assisted by Adam Rinker. Four minutes later, Whitaker broke the single game goal record with his ninth of the day, 62nd of the season, assisted by Jacob Lubawy. The Terriers were then able to score their second goal of the game. One minute later, J.R. DuBose scored his first goal of the game, ninth of the season, assisted by Jacob Lubawy. That was the 100th assist of Lubawy's career. That gave the Cougars a 22-2 lead at the end of three quarters of play.

In the fourth quarter, the Cougars offense finally slowed down, only scoring four goals. It started with Jacob Lubawy scoring his second goal of the day, 19th of the season, assisted by J.R. DuBose. Cody Randal then won the face off and ran down scoring his first goal of the game, eighth of the season, unassisted. Jacob Lubawy followed by completing his hat trick with his 20th goal of the season, assisted by Jack Neal on the man disadvantage. The Terriers scored one more goal after that cutting the Cougars lead down to just 22. J.R. DuBose then scored his second goal of the game, 10th of the season, assisted by Brady Rigdon. The Terriers answered back with another goal keeping the Cougars lead at 22. That was the final goal of the game and the Cougars won by a dominant 26-4 final score.

The Cougars were led offensively by Thomas Whitaker's nine goals. Brady Rigdon and Jacob Lubawy each had three goal, three assist, six point stat lines. Adam Rinker had five points with his one goal and team high four assists. Jesse Corser-James had a team high three caused turnovers lifting his single season total to 37, a new single season record. Corser-James set the record at 36 last season. Cody Randal had a team high 13 ground balls while winning 25-of-33 face offs. James Cipollone made one save in a scoreless first quarter to pick up his 11th win of the season. Each of the Cougars four goalies played a quarter in the game. Will Authement-Brockett was in net for the second quarter, Mario Pusateri was in for the third, making one save and Dante Raffaele recorded one save in the fourth quarter. The Cougars completed 21-of-24 clear attempts and caused the Terriers to fail 12 clear attempts.

The Cougars will be back in action on Saturday April 18th when they travel to Stubenville, Ohio for a 1 PM match up with the Franciscan Barons.