The challenge was administered the week before in practice.

Joe Battista had seen his team, the Penn State ACHA Div. I Icers, fall on hard times of late. Coming into their doubleheader over the weekend with Delaware, the Icers were victors in only one of their previous four games. And for the first time since 2000, they had more than one loss (2), before the official start of the holiday season.

As if to add insult to injury, the team was stripped of its No. 1 ranking before the game, a title that now belongs to Rhode Island, the team that beat and tied the Icers two weekends ago. Battista preached defense to his team the entire week, mainly because injuries have caused the Icers put their lineup through spin cycle to fill the void. So with all that, how would the team respond to its coach's call?

They'd answer it.

If you know Battista, you know that defense comes first on his agenda. To him, there was no more opportune time for his team to deny a club defensively.

"The goals will come, but it can never be at the expense of playing defense," Battista said before Friday's game.

Maybe goaltender Chris Matteo took those words to heart.

Matteo sat and watched from the bench two weeks ago as his fellow netminder, Paul Mammola, recorded his first career shutout as an Icer against Rhode Island, only to see him neglected the win as the game ended in a scoreless tie. He could only wonder when his first donut in the goal column would come this year.

It happened Friday night.

Matteo recorded his first shutout of the season as the Icers took game one from the Blue Hens, 3-0.

"I think he played pretty solid job and it was one of our best defensive efforts of the year," Battista said.

The Icers (12-2-1) limited the Blue Hens to only 17 shots on goal while minimizing odd-man rush opportunities, situations where they've been burnt recently.

All three goals scored on Friday were by Icer defensemen, including scores by senior Joe Maglaque and freshman Keith Jordan.

Saturday's game would be more of a see-saw battle as there were only two officials on-hand to regulate the game. A cynic might think that the lack of officiating attributed overcompensation, due to the number of penalties that were called. Hence, there were 14 penalties called in the second period, alone.

Midway through the second period, Delaware scored two goals within a span of 10 seconds. That forced Battista to take an uncharacteristic timeout to regroup his team.

He decided to make a change by moving forward Mike McMullen to the red-line, the line he started the season on but was forced to play elsewhere when the Icers were hit hard with injuries. The switch paid dividends as the Icers came back from a 3-2 deficit to tie the game at four going into the third period.

Delaware began the final period with a two-man advantage, yet another challenge in front of a team that has seen its share this season. This penalty kill would turn out to be pivotal as the Icers refused to bend and the score remained tied at four until about three minutes remaining in the period. That's when Maglaque, who finished the weekend with three goals, found a cutting Keith Jordan in front of the net and he put the puck past the Blue Hens goaltender, Mike Verdi, for the eventual game-winner.

The 5-4 victory could not have come at better time for the Icers. In fact, seven of the eight goals scored this weekend for the Icers were by defensemen.

Fittingly because this week's theme was defense.