In a battle of unbeaten hockey rivals, the Freeburg-Waterloo Raging Bulldogs outshot Columbia 31-9 en route to a 2-0 victory Tuesday night at the McKendree Metro Rec Plex in O’Fallon.

The victory improves the Raging Bulldogs to 8-0 in the Mississippi Valley Club Hockey Association. Columbia drops to 6-1, falling just behind second place Vianney (6-1-1) in the league standings.

The Ice Eagles were unable to stay out of the penalty box early on. Columbia’s second penalty of the first period, against Jack Augustin, led to a power play goal by Freeburg-Waterloo’s Nick Mumford with 4:03 remaining.

Columbia went to the penalty box seven times on the night. Freeburg-Waterloo was penalized four times, including back-to-back penalties in the third period that gave Columbia a 5-on-3 opportunity. Fortunately, the Raging Bulldogs defense and goalie Zoey Malacarne were able to kill off both penalties.

“Our defense has been solid all season and last night they continued to do so,” Freeburg-Waterloo head coach Scott Roberts said. “We have only given up 14 goals in eight games so far. A key to last night’s game was for us to stay disciplined. We know we can’t win games sitting in the penalty box.” 

Thanks to stellar goaltending by Columbia’s Londyn Little, the Ice Eagles remained in the contest throughout.

“Columbia has arguably the two best goalies in the league. Little showed that with his performance last night,” Roberts said. “We knew we had to pepper him with as many shots as we could.”

A goal by Paul Malacarne finally gave the Raging Bulldogs some breathing room with 4:20 remaining in the second period.

Prior to Tuesday’s win, Freeburg-Waterloo downed O’Fallon by the score of 8-1 on Monday night. Mumford notched two goals and an assist in that win.

“We are one-third of the way through the season and we have yet to face defeat,” Roberts said. “We know we have a long way to go and areas of our game we need to improve, but our coaching staff is very happy with our boys and girls still being undefeated!”