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Saints announce 2014 hockey award winners

Posted 4/8/14

St. Lawrence University's hockey class of 2014 took the majority of the awards at the men's program's annual banquet sponsored by the Friends of St. Lawrence Hockey on Saturday. Senior captain Kyle …

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Saints announce 2014 hockey award winners

Posted

St. Lawrence University's hockey class of 2014 took the majority of the awards at the men's program's annual banquet sponsored by the Friends of St. Lawrence Hockey on Saturday.

Senior captain Kyle Essery was named the winner of the Brian "Jinx" Doyle Award, Greg Carey was named the Stuart Winning Most Valuable Player, Jeremy Wick was the Bernie McKinnon Coaches Award Winner, Justin Baker was the Pete McGeough Award winner, Patrick Raley the Brian McFarlane Award winner and Riley Austin and Matt Weninger were named the winner of the Terry Slater Perseverance Award.

Sophomore Alex Hagen received the Paul Flanagan Most Improved Player Award, Gavin Bayreuther was the Pelletier/Stewart Rookie of the Year and Justin Bruckel was selected as the James Street 7th Player Award winner by the Friends of St. Lawrence Hockey.

Essery never missed a game in his four year career for the Saints and an outstanding penalty killer in addition to contributing solid two-way play at center. He played in 152 career games and scored 23 goals with 16 assists for 39 points. The Doyle Award recognizes leadership, character and athletic skills and is selected by the coaching staff.

Carey also played in every one of 152 games in his career and is the first player in Saint history to lead the team in scoring in each of his four collegiate seasons. First-team All ECAC for the second straight season, he is a two-time Hobey Baker Award finalist and the first Saint to make the "Hobey Hat Trick" as one of the top three finalists for the award. He scored 18 goals and had 39 assists for 57 points as a senior and finished his career with 84 goals and 101 assists for 185 points. He is the seventh player in program history to put up back-to-back 50 point seasons and is tied for second on the all-time point list, fourth in goals and eighth in career assists. He was ECAC Player of the Year as a senior and is also a finalist for the Senior CLASS Award. He was also a finalist for ECAC Student-Athlete of the Year. He signed with the Phoenix Coyotes at the end of the recently completed season and is playing in Portland.

Wick, who will play professionally in Switzerland, scored 17 goals and assisted on 18 for 35 points in his senior season and was among the nation's leaders in power play goals with 12. He finished his career with 34 goals and 40 assists for 74 points in 142 games with 31 of the goals and 32 of his assists coming in his junior and senior seasons.

Baker, who signed with the Hartford Wolf Pack at the end of the season, was one of the highest scoring defensemen in the country throughout his senior season and was a leader on the blue line for the Saints. He scored nine goals and had 24 assists for 34 points as a senior, and finished his career with 19 goals and 63 assists for 82 points in 143 games. He is sixth on the all-time Saint defensive scoring list.

Raley, one of the top men academically among athletes in the class of 2014, earned the McFarlane Award, which recognizes academic and athletic accomplishment for the second time in his career. Also the 2012 winner, Raley is a four-year member of the ECAC Hockey All Academic team and finished his career with three goals and 25 assists in 142 appearances.

Austin played in 33 games as a senior and 112 for his career for the Saints on defense. He scored a goal and had three assists as a senior and had six goals and 13 assists for his career for the Saints. He was joined as Slater Award winner by goaltender Weninger, who set Saint record for games played, starts, minutes played, saves, ties and shutouts during his four-year career. Weninger played in 132 games with 3409 saves, a .902 save percentage and a 2.96 goals against average. He had 14 career ties and eight shutouts.

Hagen played in 32 games as a sophomore and finished the season with four goals and five assists for nine points to earn the Flanagan Most Improved Player Award. Bayreuther, the ECAC Co-Rookie of the Year, was one of the leading defensive scorers in the nation, leading all freshmen defensemen and set the SLU record for points in a season by a rookie bluelineer with 36 on nine goals and 27 assists. He was named second-team All ECAC. Bruckel saw action in three games for the Saints as a junior and did not score, but was recognized for his day-to-day contributions to the Saint program in practice in addition to his game contributions as the 7th Player Award winner.