BOSTON — It has been more than a full season since Harvard lost a home game entering Friday’s contest against Yale.
The comforts of home on Friday night, though, hardly included a rocking chair, TV and potato chips. Instead, it featured hard hits and tenacious checking from a Yale team with something to prove as the Bulldogs capitalized on mistakes in a 5-2 upset victory over No. 3 Harvard.
Robbie DeMontis scored a goal and added an assist to take home the Tim Taylor Cup, which honors the former Harvard player and longtime Yale coach and is presented to the MVP of the Harvard-Yale game played at Harvard each year.
The Crimson never looked comfortable early in the game and fell behind, 2-0, on goals by Mitchell Smith and DeMontis just 26 seconds apart. Both goals came off turnovers by Crimson players that immediately headed on net through screens.
“They had us on our heels in the first 10 minutes,” said Harvard coach Ted Donato, who couldn’t really explain why his team lacked zip early. Though a good enough reason could have been the physical pressure Yale brought right from the opening faceoff.
The Crimson was able to hit the reset button coming out of the first intermission and cashed in twice to make it a 2-2 games. But more mistakes, including three on the same play, pushed Yale back into the lead.
With Harvard buzzing offensively, a puck rimmed around the boards to freshman defenseman Benjamin Foley. As the puck awkwardly bounced, Foley lost an edge and DeMontis pushed the puck ahead. Able to chase it down, he then threaded a pass that beat another Harvard rookie blueliner Riley Walsh, eventually ending up on Luke Stevens stick. When Crimson netminder Merrick Madsen overplayed the shooter, Stevens roofed the puck.
It was the type of disaster play that summed up the night for the Crimson.
“Catch up hockey is losing hockey,” said Donato. “We got it back to 2-2 and we had some chances and it looked like we were ready to get on top of them a little bit.
“It was more than one mistake. I would look at it as three points of emphasis on one play that made it 3-2. Yeah, we have a tough break and we fall, but I don’t like the way we play the 2-on-1 and I don’t like the way we defended it in the net as well.”
From that point, the story became penalties. A late second period penalty led to Ryan Hitckcock’s power play goal with 2:08 remaining in the frame, re-establishing the two-goal lead. And then as the minutes tick away, Harvard took a minor and major penalty just 1:19 apart in the final nine minutes to make a comeback hope nearly impossible.
“Some of the physical stuff late in the game is part and parcel for the rivalry,” said Donato. “But I don’t have any time for penalties. That, in itself, made it difficult to make any kind of comeback bid. We spent too much time in the box and we had to use our best players to try to keep the game at two-down. That’s just not winning hockey.”
The victory for Yale keeps a solid regular-season run in place for the Elis in Boston. Though Yale dropped a quarterfinal series at Harvard in last year’s playoffs, they are now 4-0-2 in their last six regular season games against Harvard at Bright-Landry.
Around the ECAC
No. 13 Clarkson 6, Rensselaer 0
Clarkson’s Aaron Thow scored 55 seconds in on Friday and Clarkson simply never looked back as the Golden Knights routed host Rensselaer, 6-0.
Sheldon Rempal provided a hat trick to pace the Clarkson offense. Goaltender Jake Kielly needed just 17 save in net to earn the shutout.
Dartmouth 4, Brown 3
Host Dartmouth jumped out to a 3-0 lead against Brown but had to hold on for dear life as the Bears rally fell short giving the Big Green a 4-3 win.
After Daniel Warpecha gave Dartmouth a 3-0 lead 22 seconds into the middle frame, Brown scored twice in a 31 seconds span to pull within a goal. From there, though, the clubs traded goals and Dartmouth’s Devin Buffalo stopped seven third period shots to earn the victory.
Colgate 0, Princeton 0
Despite mustering a combined 79 shots, neither Colgate nor Princeton could find the back of the net as the clubs skated to a scoreless tie at Hobey Baker Rink.
Ryan Ferland stopped 36 shots for the host Tigers but was outdone by Colton Point who stopped 43 shots for the Raiders. The game featured just a single penalty to each club.
Cornell 2, Quinnipiac 1
Brendon Smith and Morgan Barron each netted goals while Matthew Galajda stopped 28 of the 29 shots he faced as No. 11 Cornell dealt host No. 18 Quinnipiac a 2-1 defeat. The win improves the Big Red to 3-0-0 on the season.
Matt Forchuk scored the lone Quinnipiac goal with 5:36 left in regulation to pull the Bobcats within a goal but that was as close as they would get. Andrew Shortridge made 18 saves in taking the loss for Quinnipiac.
Union 3, St. Lawrence 1
Union, which began the year 0-5, pulled off its fifth straight win to return to .500, defeating St. Lawrence, 3-1, at Appleton Arena.
Cole Maier, Sebastian Vidmar and Zach Emelifeonwu each tallied goals for the Dutchmen, which improved to 4-1-0 in road games. Darion Hanson stopped 17 to earn the win while his counterpart Arthur Brey made 38 saves in defeat for the Saints.
