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WEST DUNDEE, IL- A 7 A.M. redeye to Illinois, with a 8:40 home time puck drop provided Central Michigan Division 3 with enough baptism-by-fire for their first road trip of the season. What awaited was a battle against Northern Illinois’ Division 2 team, and their first true test of the season.

With a raucous, capacity crowd at Leafs Ice Centre mixed between a contingency of Huskies and Chippewas, CMU wasted no time in getting their first goal of the night, a power play goal,  from the Captain James Gleason’s third goal of the season, a hard slapper from the left side circle, and for the third straight game, gave CMU a 1-0 lead 3:04 into the game.

This, would be how the chippy, momentum shifting first period would stand, until a weird bounce from a Northern Illinois shot would allow Matthew Gould to fire one past CMU’s Riley Morgan to tie the score at one. Not looking to be outdone in the final five minutes, however, CMU would fire back with only a few minutes remaining from Alex Osborn’s third of the season to make it 2-1 in the first intermission. CMU leading in the special teams department, 1/1 on the Penalty Kill. and 1/2 on the Power Play.

The second would prove to be a grittier, dirtier contest than what was previewed in the first, as equal amounts of big blows and penalties would be divided amongst the two foes. For mostly the entire second period, the teams would trade chances on the power play and with plenty of offensive pressure, but the defensives held and the goaltenders did enough to keep it scoreless until the final eight minutes, when Nate Allgaier would score his 100th goal as a Chippewa and his first of the season to make it 3-1. With a power play opportunity late into the second, Robert Apter of the Huskies would fire one past from the right side circle to make it a 3-2 game. Not even ten seconds later, Shane Agnello would jam home a Nate Allgaier shot to take a 4-2 lead into the final intermission.

Frame three would open with CMU looking to play keep-away from Northern Illinois in terms of puck possession and score, and they’d be able to accomplish that without much vigor. After another stretch of opportunities in the period, CMU would jam an opportunistic shot off a turnover from Nate Allgaier to result in Dalton Sutherland’s ninth of the season. Jordan Niedziela of NIU would find a way to get one in against Morgan, but in the waning minutes of play, Ryan Tyrer’s fourth of the season of the season would close this runaway out at a score of 6-3, moving CMU to 3-0 for the first time since 2015, and second time in team history.

Central Michigan would finish the night 3/6 on the Power Play, and an impressive 5/6 on the Penalty Kill. Coach James Cadzow was impressed with the team’s effort in the victory.

CMU Hockey returns to action at 3:30 CST as they look to sweep the series against NIU D2, and start their campaign 4-0. Pregame starts at 3:20 CST on ChipsHockeycast.com with Shawn Bednard on the call.