NORTH ANDOVER, Mass. — Merrimack and Massachusetts-Lowell met on Friday night in a battle between two nationally-ranked teams in a back-and-forth battle that fittingly ended in a 1-all tie.
Merrimack’s penalty kill unit and defensive play was the main reason that this game remained tied after the unit went 4-for-4 on penalty kills.
“Another playoff atmosphere game,” Merrimack coach Mark Dennehy said. “I think they’re a really good team and we are, too. All in all, points are hard to come by in Hockey East. We’d like two, but we got one.”
The first period saw Lowell come out strong early with a breakaway goal from C.J. Smith just 1:26 into the game.
The middle frame saw much as the first, but instead, Merrimack capitalized on a scoring opportunity instead of the visitors. Ben Bahe followed a shot from teammate Brian Christie that rebounded off of the pad of Kevin Boyle and backhanded it through to tie the game at 1-1 just 3:36 into the period.
The penalty kill came into play yet again when Merrimack was faced with a 5-on-3 late in the period that the Warriors able to kill and send the game heading into the final frame tied.
“Our penalty kill was excellent,” boasted Dennehy. “I give Curtis Carr a lot of credit. It begins and ends with our goalie, [Collin] Delia, who was excellent, and really great play by our defensemen.”
The third period was filled with great special teams play and great goaltending by both Boyle and Delia.
Overtime was more of the how the first 60 minutes played out.
“I thought it was an entertaining hockey game,” noted UML coach Norm Bazin. “When you score first and you’re 100 percent on the penalty kill, those are the positives. The down side is you get outshot 2-1. I think we have some things to improve on, but it wasn’t a total disaster by any means.”
