Sunday, No. 1 Michigan State looked to finish off the series sweep of Lindenwood with a win on home ice. The Spartans took care of the Lindenwood Lions handedly on Friday night winning 4-0 behind a Trey Augustine shutout.
Luca Di Pasquo stepped in Sunday for the Spartans and earned a shutout of his own as MSU won 2-0. In his second start this year, Di Pasquo was able to earn his first career shutout.
"It feels good," Di Pasquo said. "You want to be a part of the team more than just backing up and it feels great to get some starts and get some touches and really contribute in that way."
Gavin O'Connell found himself alone in the slot and was able to get the scoring started for the Spartans just 4:19 into the game.
The goalies were a big story in this one as Lindenwood's goaltender, Owen Bartoszkiewicz, turned aside 35 of 37 shots he faced. MSU threw a lot of rubber his way to no avail, until the freshman, Mikey DeAngelo, was able to tuck a rebound in with 16:28 remaining in the game.
That would prove to be all that was needed to get the win in this one as the Spartans were able to keep Lindenwood off the scoreboard all series. The final shot totals (37-14 in favor of MSU) was a good representation of how dominating their performance was on Sunday at Munn Ice Arena.
"Good weekend for our team," Coach Adam Nightingale said. "I think it's the same every week. You want to see improvement, you want to see growth and you want to see the whole team buy in to how we need to play to be a good hockey team. I thought we practiced really good before, there was longer stretches tonight of how we need to do it than there was on Friday night."
MSU's captain Red Savage left the game at the end of the first period after an awkward collision with a Lindenwood player. Savage went down the tunnel immediately and would not return. Nightingale did not comment on the extent of the injury.
The Spartans now own an 11-1 record on the season to go along with a nine-game winning streak, which is the fewest combined losses/ties to start a season since the 1988/1989 season. They hit the road next week as they head up to Madison to take on Wisconsin in another important Big Ten matchup.