[media-credit name=”Brendan Dillon | The Quinnipiac Chronicle” align=”alignright” width=”200″][/media-credit]The Quinnipiac men’s ice hockey team (13-15-2, 8-10-2 ECAC Hockey) went all out for its seniors on senior night in its final game of the season at the Frank Perrotti, Jr. Arena, beating the Rensselaer Engineers (RPI) (5-23-4, 4-14-4 ECAC Hockey) by a score of 4-1.

“I thought we played really well tonight,” Quinnipiac head coach Rand Pecknold said. “Those seniors have done a great job for us over the last four years so it was great to get a win for them.”

For the second night in a row, the Bobcats started out strong, but this time they were able to strike first. Junior forward Craig Martin was able to get the monkey off his back, scoring his first goal since Nov. 18th against Yale.

Martin snapped a shot from the top of the circle through traffic, putting the puck top shelf for his fourth of the season. The second period featured much of the same for the Bobcats, who pushed the pace and did not allow the Engineers to create many scoring chances.

After a major penalty by RPI roughly halfway through the second period, Quinnipiac was able to pull away, scoring two goals on the five-minute power play. Junior assistant captain Scott Davidson netted his second goal of the season, blasting a slap-shot past Engineer freshman netminder Linden Marshall off a one timer, set up by freshman forward Matt Forchuk.

“We were pretty lucky to be out there as the third unit power play,” Davidson said. “I don’t get much power play time, so it was nice to get that pass from [Forchuk].”

The Bobcats would build off of that goal on the same power play. Junior defenseman Brandon Fortunato finished a rebound opportunity in tight, while sophomore defenseman Brogan Rafferty picked up an assist on the goal with a slap shot aimed at the pad of Marshall.

Pecknold has been impressed with Fortunato’s play recently,  as he has tallied four goals in the past six games.

[media-credit id=2242 align=”alignright” width=”300″][/media-credit]“It was just a matter of time before the points were gonna come,” Pecknold said. “We’ve been a little snakebit this year with hitting posts and guys missing empty nets, and Brandon has set up a lot of guys who don’t score those goals, so his points should be a lot higher.”

While RPI scored a goal in the third period to spoil a shutout for freshman goaltender Keith Petruzzelli (21 saves), the Bobcats did not let that get in their way of coming away with two points tonight.

Senior forward Bo Pieper buried his 11th goal of the year, pouncing on a loose puck out front. Tanner MacMaster drove to the net, but was broken up by the RPI defenders, but the puck squirted out to Pieper, who finished on another man-advantage opportunity.

Quinnipiac will look to carry the momentum from tonight into next weekend. The Bobcats will close out the regular season with games at St. Lawrence (7-23-2, 3-16-1 in ECAC Hockey) and at Clarkson (19-8-5, 11-5-4 in ECAC Hockey) next weekend. The Bobcats stand in ninth place in the conference going into the final weekend.