Last night, Rochester Institute of Technology was unable to turn the red light on for 60 minutes against Bentley.
In the rematch tonight, RIT only needed 34 seconds to put the puck in the net. The Tigers rode that momentum en route to their own shutout, 4-0.
“I thought last night’s game was an easier game for us,” RIT coach Wayne Wilson said. “We didn’t get any luck in regards to scoring goals and we didn’t get the saves to prevent the goals. That was the difference in last night’s game. You can’t describe it. If you look at the shots and chances we had, last night was more like the 4-0 game than tonight.
“This game was a lot more contested. We get the bounces tonight and it winds up in a 4-0 win.”
“We had a couple of turnovers early on in the game and cost us the game as we were down 2-0,” Bentley coach Ryan Soderquist said. “We couldn’t find a way to find the back of the net. Their goaltender [Josh Watson] played a great game. RIT showed up with a lot of energy tonight, and we didn’t, and they deserved to win.”
Watson made 31 saves for his second career shutout.
“It’s a crazy position,” Watson said of goaltenders. “It’s such a momentum game. It’s really important to get the guy’s confidence back. They [shutouts] keep getting better.”
The quick goal started when Chris Saracino from the left point passed it towards Matt Garbowsky at the right faceoff circle. Garbowsky redirected it to the opposite post whereupon Brad McGowan tipped it past Branden Komm, the star of last night’s game.
Dan Schuler made it 2-0 at 12:04 thanks to a failed clearing pass by Bentley. The puck made its way down low to the goalie’s left where Schuler took two swipes at it to knock it home.
“Garbowsky and McGowan, we were expecting production from them from the start of the year and they are coming into their own,” Wilson said. “The guy that impresses me as well, Schuler, his strength on the puck, strong forechecking, making good plays. They got some chemistry going right now and we’d like to keep them on a roll.”
Bryan Potts completed the scoring in the first period at 17:51. The play started after Watson made a big save. RIT quickly transitioned the puck, and Potts from the left point let go of a high shot which sailed over Komm’s left shoulder just under the crossbar.
RIT made it 4-0 on the power play at 12:28 of the second period with essentially an “own” goal. Mike Colavecchia’s crossing pass inadvertently deflected off Bentley’s Brett Switzer straight into an open net as Komm had no chance to recover after the unexpected change of direction. Watson was credited with an assist, his first in college.
Like last night, the third period was played out to see if the shutout could be attained. Neither team scored, so the fortunes were reversed.
“I thought we did a very good job shutting things down once we got to 4-0,” Wilson said.
