Wisconsin Drops Season Opener to RPI, 5-1
October 11, 2002 | Men's Hockey
The Wisconsin Badgers (0-1-0, 0-0-0 WCHA) opened this year's season with a loss to Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute 5-1 in the second game of the Ice Breaker Invitational held at the Kohl Center.
Wisconsin's lone goal was scored by Frosh defender Tom Gilbert at 5:05 of the first period. John Eichelberger passed the puck up to Pete Talafous who fed the puck to Gilbert high in the slot to tally his first career goal as a Badger.
Mikael Hammarstrom tied it up for the Engineers 1-1, at 7:54 of the first period off a feed from Scott Basiuk. RPI never looked back and before the close of the first period RPI's Ben Barr scored the game-winning goal for RPI.
In the second period, the Engineers continued to extend its lead with goals from Nick Economakos and Vic Pereira bringing the score 4-1.
Scott Basiuk who assisted on two goals earlier in the night scored the final goal of the game on the power play for the final score of 5-1.
Bruckler made 20 saves in the game.
Tomorrow night Wisconsin will face Northern Michigan in the third place game of the Ice Breaker tournament at 4:00 p.m. at the Kohl Center. Earlier in the day Northern Michigan tied Boston University 4-4 in regulation but lost 4-3 in a shootout.
