SHREVEPORT, La. In the final two-game series of the 2021 fall semester, the East Texas Baptist University hockey team swept the University of Texas Longhorns in back-to-back, 6-1, wins. These two wins improve their record to 16-0-0 for the TCHC and overall record to 17-2-0.
 
In Friday's inaugural Teddy Bear Toss tilt, Blake Branum grabbed his first and second collegiate goals. Freshman Ryley Hogan also tallied his first career goal. The remaining three goals were scored by Carson Loos, Timothy Zittel, and Caleb Goudreau. Angus Laing was in the net for on Friday night blocking 15 out of the 16 total shots on goal.
 
In Saturday's contest, Spencer Mills scored half of the ETBU goals—earning his second hat trick of the season. Devon Baird, Tristan Aun, and Mitchell Dolese all scored one goal each. Tyler Fitzgerald was in between the pipes successfully shutting down 17 out of the 18 total shots faced.
 

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GAME 1: ETBU 6, UT 1
 Game one of the two-game series was the inaugural Teddy Bear Toss game for the Tigers. When ETBU scored their first goal of the game the crowd would celebrate by throwing teddy bears onto the ice. The teddy bears were then donated to The Rainbow Room organization and given to less fortunate children as Christmas gifts. The ETBU fans remarkably donated over 300 teddy bears to The Rainbow Room.
 
The first period started out unusually slow-paced. ETBU was on edge throughout the entire period as the defense stayed strong in the Longhorn's offensive zone. With 5:56 left before the first intermission, Branum scored his first college goal off a pass from Matt Duncan. Branum celebrated his first goal with over 300 teddy bears being thrown onto the ice. ETBU had the 1-0 lead as they headed to the second period.
 
The second period went scoreless, for both the Tigers and the Longhorns. ETBU's penalty kill special team kept the intensity up by stopping three different 2:00 minor penalties keeping the 1-0 lead.
 
The gears shifted for the 3^rd period when both teams came out firing on all cylinders. Freshman Dominic Desjardin and Spencer Mills set Hogan up to light the lamp for his first time as a Tiger and in his home debut game, increasing the lead to 2-0. The Longhorns didn't waste time responding. Just 1:08 after the Tiger's second goal, UT went on the power play to score their only goal of the game coming within one, 2-1.
 
Roughly a minute later, Branum scored his second goal of the night to take back the Tiger's two-goal lead. Five minutes later, ETBU received another penalty, forcing the them back on a one-man deficit. But Loos used this added pressure to fuel his fire and snagged a short-handed goal with 10:00 left in regulation for the lead of the Longhorns, 4-1.
 
With only 7:22 left in the third period, Timothy Zittel had a breakaway opportunity fighting off two defenders but was blocked by the Longhorn's Goaltender. As the puck deflected off the goalie's blocker pad, Zittel managed to catch his own [airborne] rebound and put the puck top-shelf improving the Tiger's lead to 5-1.
 
Shortly after Zittel's goal, the Tigers received another penalty with only 4:22 remaining in regulation. Despite being down a skater, Goudreau came in from the blue line skating through the entire Texas Power Play Unit going 1-on-1 for the short-handed goal. That gave ETBU the 6-1 lead and win.
 

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GAME 2: ETBU 6, UT 1
 ETBU wrapped up the fall semester of hockey with another 6-1 win on Saturday. It was the second week in a row that ETBU swept Texas moving to 17-2-0.
 
The first period started out at a slower pace, for the second night in row going scoreless until the halfway mark. Mills got the puck rolling at 10:24 when he scored the first goal of his hat trick, assisted by Loos and Dominic Desjardins. Another 10:30 went by before the period saw another goal. With just barely 1:00 left, Aun scored putting the Tigers up, 2-0. Then, the literal last second before the intermission, Dolese lit the lamp to put the Tigers three goals over UT headed into the 2^nd period.
 
Almost precisely like the period beforehand, both teams went scoreless until the  12:37 mark when Baird scored the Tiger's only goal. He was assisted by Matt Duncan, improving their lead to 4-0. Roughly 6:00 passed by before ETBU received a 2:00 minor penalty for tripping. The Longhorn's had a one-man-advantage for only 0:09 before scoring their only goal of the game. UT's goal was the last goal scored in the 2^nd period pushing the score to 4-1.
 
In the final 20 minutes of the match, the Tiger's only goal was to keep UT from scoring. With only 0:44 left in regulation Duncan received the puck from Caleb Kerns and passed it to Mills who buried the puck in the back of the net for the second time in the game. A mere 0:13 went by before Mills gave us Déjà vu by scoring his hat trick goal off a pass from Aun. That goal made it 6-1 as the final.
 
ETBU will be off until early January when they travel to Colorado for four games.