TORONTO – William Rouleau registered a hat-trick and added an assist as No.7 ranked McGill cruised to a 7-1 road victory over York at the Canlan Sports Centre, Friday.
 
The result improved McGill's record to 17-5-2 and maintained the Redbirds share of first place atop the OUA East Division with Ottawa (17-5-2) and just four games remaining before playoffs. Waiting in the weeds is UQTR (17-5-1) and fourth-place Concordia (16-7-2).
 
It was the second consecutive 7-1 victory for the Redbirds, who sank the Nipissing Lakers 7-1 in Montreal last week. This marked the first time in a decade that McGill has tallied seven or more times in consecutive games since turning the feat with a 9-2 win over Nipissing on Feb. 7, 2014, followed by a 7-6 overtime win against UOIT (since renamed Ontario Tech) on Feb. 14, 2014. This was also the first time in the team's 147-year history that McGill had posted identical 7-1 victories in back-to-back games. This sets the stage to match the last time that McGill had scored at least seven goals in three consecutive contests, a feat that the squad accomplished in 1993.

The Redbirds, who had a 45-25 edge in shots, led 3-0 after the first period and 6-1 after two.
 
"It was an all business win tonight," said McGill head coach David Urquhart. "We were able to do it the right way and played with structure that allowed us to create offensively. The Rouleau-Uba Frattaroli line has found another level over the last three games. They work really well together  and they've kind of taken turns at putting the puck in the back of the net. It's fun to watch when they're clicking like that."
 
The trio has combined for 10 goals in the last three games.

Rouleau struck early and often. The 23-year-old management sophomore from St. Basile de Portneuf, Que., opened the scoring just 40 seconds after the initial puck drop. He made it 2-0 at 15:39, then assisted on centre Brandon Frattaroli's first of two goals, at 18:49. Rouleau added his 11th marker of the season at 8:41 of the middle frame to put the Redbirds ahead 6-0.  It was the team's first hat-trick since last season, when Alexandre Gagnon accomplished the feat on the road in a 4-3 win against Ontario Tech on Feb. 11, 2023.

Rouleau, a speedy left-winger who was tops on the team in scoring as a rookie, now leads the squad in points and is ranked sixth among the league leaders with an 11-21-32 record in 24 contests, two points ahead of Frattaroli (10-20-30).
 
Right-winger Eric Uba, a senior from Kitchener, Ont., had four assists. Uba extended his current point-scoring streak to three games after posting a league-high nine-game streak in the fall semester. He is 14th in the OUA scoring race with a 14-14-28 record in 22 games. It was the first four-assist soiree by a McGill player since Nov. 16, 2019, when Michael Cramarossa accomplished that in a 6-2 home-ice win over Laurentian. The last McGill player to earn four assists in a road game was Jerome Verrier in a 5-0 victory at Concordia on Feb. 13, 2015.
 
Frattaroli also collected an assist to finish with a three-point outing.

Rounding out the scoring for the visitors was defencemen Taylor Ford and Alexandre Blanchard. Ford, a fifth-year veteran and the team captain, now has four goals after scoring none over his previous four seasons.
 
McGill now has 14 goals from its blueline corps, the most since getting 16 from the back-end in 2019-20.
 
The lone York marksman was Jayden McCarthy who made it 6-1 at 9:09 of the second period. It spoiled a shutout bid by sophomore Fabio Iacobo of St. Leonard, Que., who was making his first start since an exhibition game at Yale in late December. Iacobo turned aside 24 of 25 shots and improved his record to 4-1 in seven league appearances.
 
York goaltender Carter Serhyenko, a sophomore, saved 38 of 45 shots and took the loss as his record tumbled to 3-14.
 
McGill continued its dominance on special teams, going 1-for-2 on the power-play and snuffing out both shorthanded chances. The Redbirds continue to lead the nation in both power-play success (32.1%) and penalty-killing (89.8%).

The result improved McGill's lifetime record to 24-12-6 in 42 meetings with the Lions since they first crossed paths in 1981.

The Redbirds will look for a fourth straight win when it heads to Oshawa on Saturday (Jan. 27) for a 3 p.m. matinee against the Ontario Tech Ridgebacks.
 
SCORING SUMMARY
 
OUA STATS & STANDINGS
 
HOW McGILL FARES NATIONALLY

SOURCE
Earl Zukerman
Sports Information Officer
Athletics & Recreation
McGill University
514-983-7012 (cell.)
www.mcgillathletics.ca
earl.zukerman@mcgill.ca