The game plan going into Saturday night’s Atlantic Hockey championship game against AIC was easier said than done.

Playing a tight, disciplined game, trying to limit the skilled Yellowjackets’ prime scoring chances and winning the special teams battle could go a long way toward upsetting the top seed.

Unfortunately for Air Force none of those things happened for long, and as a result, AIC left the ice at Utica, N.Y., with its third AHA playoff title in four seasons after a 7-0 rout of the sixth-seeded Falcons. It was the first time Air Force lost an AHA championship game in eight appearances.

“I’ve been here a lot of times and never had to give that speech before,” Air Force coach Frank Serratore said. “There was nothing good about that from our perspective. We’ve got to give all the credit in the world to AIC. They were better than us in every area of the game.

“We tried to make up with physicality, and that backfired. We took some bad penalties and they capitalized on every mistake we made. Their special teams were outstanding.”

Penalties torpedoed AFA’s chances

The Yellowjackets seized an early lead, endured an uptick in the Falcons’ checking and then capitalized on repeated special teams opportunities. Incredibly, just one of the seven AIC goals – the first one, 5:16 into the game by Julius Janhonen – came at even strength.

The Falcons hit the self-destruct button in the second period, and AIC, as skilled and veteran of a team as the league has seen in some time, took advantage repeatedly.

The 1-0 lead stretched to 4-0 before the second was half over.

“We didn’t handle some of that game well,” Serratore reiterated. “We took some bad penalties and some chippy penalties, penalties that we’re not proud of. We’re all about hard hockey, not cheap hockey. It got away from us a little bit.”

Jake Stella made it 2-0 on a power-play one-timer from the lower right circle 1:37 in. Chris Dodero scored the first of his two goals during a 4-on-4 situation that came after another Air Force penalty negated a power play only 17 seconds old. Defenseman Zak Galambos scored another power-play goal from the left dot after the Falcons’ fourth penalty of the period.

And it could have been worse. Air Force (16-17-3) had to kill off the first of two five-minute majors when defenseman Mitchell Digby was whistled for slew footing then ejected after a video review with 7:08 to go.

More of the same in the third

The third period was Groundhog Day, only substituting a Dodero short-handed goal for the 4v4 strike. Dodero scored on a two-on-one with Justin Cole after Cole intercepted a pass in the neutral zone midway 9:14 in.

Only a minute and change later, co-captain Luke Rowe was ejected for a hit from behind, and the Yellowjackets scored twice during the next 3:30 – by Blake Bennett and Janhonen again – to ensure the outcome.

In all, the Falcons had to kill 20 minutes of penalties, and the residual effect of energy expended doing that reflected not only on the scoreboard but in the fact they were outshot by a wide margin (31-18) and uncharacteristically dominated in the face-off circle (40-23). AIC was 4-for-8 with the man advantage.

Last call for the masked man

The loss also marked the end of goaltender Alex Schilling‘s NCAA career.

Before the season, the senior became the first goalie in Serratore’s 25 seasons to be selected a captain, and his even-keeled demeanor played a massive role in the Falcons integrating numerous newcomers into their locker room and lineup. At points, as many as six or seven freshmen had to play regularly.

“He led us from the front,” junior assistant captain Willie Reim said. “We all were able to follow him. It will be tough without him.”

Schilling, who made 23 saves, didn’t have much chance on several of the AIC goals, as the Yellowjackets masterfully passed to open spaces.

“He came in as a sophomore and stole the show,” junior defenseman Brandon Koch added. “We don’t make it here if we don’t have him. He’s a big piece to that puzzle.”

The future looks bright

The good news was that despite Saturday’s outcome, the Falcons won several key games down the stretch to lock up an AHA first-round bye, won a hard-fought quarterfinal series at West Point and then beat a very good, veteran RIT team to reach the championship.

“Frank alluded to growth during the year. We were really struggling to win the close games at the beginning of the year and obviously we had two overtime wins against Army and a really close one against RIT,” Reim noted.” Being able to win close games is Air Force hockey, and hopefully we can carry that on. Now that we’ve (had) a lot of growth hopefully we can settle in and play a consistent brand of hockey next year.”

Give Schilling was the only senior on the roster, and that only five juniors played significant minutes, the Falcons are in good shape moving forward.

“Are we better than we showed tonight? I’d like to think so,” Serratore said. “We weren’t the last man standing, but we were the second to last man standing. We had a very young group.

“We’ve had a couple of stinkers but most of them were early. As of late, we played well enough to earn a first-round bye, we had success on the road, which is not easy for anyone, let alone a young team. … There’s a lot to be optimistic about.”

Notes: Koch and forward Will Gavin were selected to the all-tournament team. Koch had two goals on Friday, and Gavin had a goal and was plus-2 in the 4-3 semifinal win against RIT. … Koch also was selected third-team all-Atlantic Hockey, while newcomers Digby and center Clayton Cosentino made the league’s all-rookie team.

©First Line Editorial 2022