ERIE, Pa. - Sophomore goaltender Brandon Wildung turned aside 37 shots to lift the Mercyhurst University men's hockey team to a 4-2 victory over the visiting Black Knights of Army West Point in front of just over 1,000 fans at the Mercyhurst Ice Center on Friday night. The Lakers improved to 4-3-0 overall and moved to 3-0-0 in the Atlantic Hockey standings. The Black Knights dropped to 0-2-0 and 0-1-0 respectively.

The win gave Mercyhurst head coach Rick Gotkin his 497th career victory as he inches closer to becoming the 23rd coach in the history of college hockey, at any division, to record 500 career victories. The win also continued the dominance by the Lakers in the all-time series against Army. Mercyhurst improved to 36-9-4 lifetime against the Black Knights and extended the team's unbeaten streak to 21 games in the all-time series (17-0-4). Army has not posted a victory over Mercyhurst since a 4-3 win at West Point on January 10, 2009 and has not defeated the Lakers in Erie since February 25, 2006.
 
But, those streaks did not extend with ease on Friday night as the visitors dominated play in each of the second and third periods after Mercyhurst stormed out to a 3-1 lead after the opening twenty minutes. After the Lakers outshot Army, 9-6, in the opening period, the Black Knights responded by outshooting Mercyhurst, 33-9, over the course of the final two periods. However, in those two periods, Army could only get one shot past Wildung who was brilliant in picking up his fourth victory of the season.

The Lakers wasted little time in getting to Army netminder Cole Bruns as freshman Derek Barach sniped a shot, just under the crossbar, from a bad angle along the right wing just 1:44 into the contest to give the hosts a 1-0 lead. Junior defenseman Philippe Drouin and senior forward Kyle Cook had the assists on Barach's second career goal. 

It was Cook's eighth assist of the season which leads the country. He now has at least one point in six of the team's seven games this season.

Army responded with a power play goal at the 10:06 mark of the opening period when Joe Kozlak buried a centering feed past Wildung to knot the game at 1-1. Trevor Fidler and Conor Andrle had the assists on the goal.

The Lakers countered with two goals in an 82-second span to close out the first period scoring. Senior defenseman Anthony Mastrodicasa, playing in his first game of the season after returning from an injury, blasted a shot from the point through heavy traffic that beat Bruns at 12:16 for a 2-1 Laker lead. The power play marker was assisted by freshmen Taylor Best and Lester Lancaster. Sophomore Bryan Sienerth followed with his second goal of the season at 13:28 to give the Lakers a 3-1 lead after one. Sophomore Patrick Piacentini fired a shot from the right point that went wide of the net, but a hard carom off the end wall ended up on the stick of Sienerth at the left side of the goal. The Erie native jammed it past Bruns for, what turned out to be, his first collegiate game-winning goal.

The score remained 3-1 until Army cut the lead to one with 9:57 left in regulation when Nick DeCenzo beat Wildung for his first goal of the season. Andrle and Fidler had the helpers.

Army continued to maintain heavy pressure inside the Mercyhurst zone down the stretch, but Wildung kept the Black Knights from tying the contest. Then, with Bruns pulled for an extra attacker, junior Kyle Dutra picked up a loose puck inside the Mercyhurst zone and fired it, essentially, the length of the ice. His shot found the back of the net for his first goal of the season and put the icing on the cake. Senior Mychal Monteith had the lone assist on the empty-net tally.

Wildung, named the game's first star, turned aside 37-of-39 Army shots to improve to 4-3-0 overall and 3-0-0 in conference play. In three starts against Atlantic Hockey foes, Wildung has stopped 91-of-96 shots (.948 save percentage) and has posted a 1.67 goals against average. Bruns, making his first start of the season, stopped 14 shots in the loss.

Mercyhurst was 1-for-6 on the power play, which included a five-minute opportunity that started in the first and carried over to the second. The Black Knights were 1-for-5 with the man advantage. The Lakers did dominate in the faceoff circle, winning 39-of-59 draws. Freshman Josh Lammon won 15 of his 18 faceoffs in the victory.

The two teams will conclude the weekend series at the Mercyhurst Ice Center on Saturday night. Faceoff is scheduled for 7:05 p.m.