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ROCHESTER, N.Y. – Colgate’s Darcy Murphy’s somewhat flukish goal with 1:18 left in regulation spoiled the fun for a sellout crowd of 4,300, as Colgate defeated RIT, 4-3.
The Gene Polisseni Center on RIT’s campus is in its second year of operation. During the inaugural year, it saw great crowds with an average attendance eclipsing their old smaller digs, Ritter Arena. However, the Polisseni Center never had a sellout.
Thus, RIT’s president Bill Destler issued a challenge to the RIT community — sellout the first home game against Colgate, and I’ll dye my hair orange.
The challenge was met and during the second intermission, Destler took a seat at center ice and had his hair dyed orange.
“I think it’s great,” RIT coach Wayne Wilson said. “To get the support from him in general is tremendous. Good on him for doing that. I don’t think I could do that. He’s a proud president of RIT and brought a lot of attention to the team, obviously.”
“I thought there was great energy in the building,” Colgate coach Don Vaughan said. “Obviously, a great crowd on their side.”
The winning goal came when a shot from the high slot bounced over the shoulder of Mike Rotolo, falling on the line.
“We backed off,” Wilson said. “We kind of opened it up. We gave them the opportunity. I thought it went off the crossbar and dropped down. I thought we knocked it in. Their guys were diving for it, too.”
“It was a scramble,” Vaughan said. “It looked like to me, Darcy Murphy got a little bit of a piece of it. I don’t know if their goalie knocked it in with his stick going back. It may have been going over anyway.”
The teams traded goals throughout the game. After a scoreless first period, Tim Harrison put the Raiders in front, knocking in a rebound from a Kevin Lough shot at 8:43.
Less than three minutes later, Alex Perron-Fontaine from the left slot took advantage of Charlie Finn down on the ice.
Two minutes later, Colgate was back in front to close the scoring in the second period. Rotolo seemed to think the puck was already past him. Instead, it sat next to the post as Brett Corkey saw it first to tap it in.
After the president dyed his hair, Greg Amlong got the sellout crowd going just 1:02 into the third period, flying down the right side and blasting a rocket past Finn to tie the game.
At 11:40, Mike Borkowski once again put Colgate in front. After a poor clear in front, Borkowski backhanded it in.
That was followed three minutes later by a Myles Powell shot from the slot, tying the game for the third time.
“We got a veteran club,” Vaughan said when asked how his team maintained their composure having RIT come back every time they took the lead. “Great leadership is probably the real reason. Mike Borkowski is probably one of the best captains I’ve ever had. He’s got a great calming presence on the bench.”
Overall, Wilson was happy with the effort by the Tigers, who outshot Colgate, 46-27.
“I thought we played way better tonight than we did last night,” he said. “I was way more encouraged. I was disappointed with the results, but I can live with our play tonight.”
However, RIT is 0-4-1 (0-4 against the ECAC). The Tigers begin conference play (they have only one nonconference game the rest of the season) with a pair of games at American International.
Colgate (3-2) continues nonconference play, hosting the defending national champions, Providence, for a pair.
