LOWELL, Mass – Two teams in similar spots fighting for their playoff lives met on Friday night at Tsongas Center as the No. 7 seed Lowell Riverhawks hosted the No. 10 Merrimack Warriors in game one (best-of-three) of their opening round Hockey East Tournament series.
Three high tempo periods were not enough to decide the contest after a late goal by Jace Henig tied the game at one and forced the game into sudden-death overtime.
Forward Ludvig Larsson clapped home the game-winner at 18:01 of the overtime to lift the Warriors to a comeback 2-1 victory, allowing Merrimack the opportunity to close out the series and advance to the Hockey East quarterfinals on Saturday night in game-two. Sami Tavernier assisted on both the game-tying and game-winning goals by Merrimack.
“I thought that was a heck of a hockey game,” said Merrimack head coach Mark Dennehy. “I thought that either team could have won; that was worth the price of admission. Everybody who came out to tonight’s was pretty entertained. Both teams had chances. We were fortunate enough to come out with the win. It certainly took all we had to get that one.”
Connor Wilson opened up the scoring at 15:52 of the first period when the junior right winger stole the puck in the high slot on a Merrimack breakout attempt and riffled home a shot that glove side on Warriors goaltender Craig Pantano to put Lowell ahead 1-0. Riverhawks goaltender Christoffer Hernberg (39 saves) kept it a 1-0 Lowell lead at the first intermission thanks to a sprawling right-to-left save on a breakaway by Mathieu Tibbet with under a minute to play in the period.
The second period began with Merrimack killing off two straight Lowell power plays. At the end of the second power play, Dominic Dockery came out of the box and was gift-wrapped a breakaway off of a neutral zone turnover by the Riverhawks. However, Dockery fired high and wide of the cage and the score remained 1-0 Lowell at the end of two periods.
Merrimack came out in the third period and upped its tempo in search of the tying goal. After a series of tremendous scoring opportunities throughout the period generated by a relentless cycle attack were all turned aside by Hernberg, the Warriors finally broke through at 15:33. A failed clear by the Riverhawks was kept in at the blue line by Brett Seney and the senior forward and New Jersey Devils draft pick fired it down low to Sami Tavernier, who dished a feed to Hennig out in front and Hennig shot the puck home five-hole to tie the game at one.
Asked about his team’s ability to cause offensive zone turnovers and create those secondary scoring chances throughout the third period and the overtime, Dennehy said that his team was just trying to find a balance between conservative and aggressive on the front end.
“I thought it went both ways,” said Dennehy. “I thought they had a couple in the overtime too where they were disruptive. You got to be really careful in overtime hockey because you got a lot of tired bodies and you need to make sure you are not out there gassed. There may have been a couple times tonight where we got them out there tired and they did the same to us.”
Neither team was able to net a go-ahead goal in the final 4:27 of regulation, so the game headed to continuous sudden-death overtime. In the extra period, Merrimack carried the majority of the play and set up shop in the Lowell end. A series of net-mouth scrambles were turned aside by Hernberg to keep the Riverhawks alive. However, at 18:01, Larsson broke in for the Warriors on a rush generated off of a neutral zone turnover and sniped home a slap shot far-post to complete the comeback and give Merrimack the 1-0 series lead.
Dennehy also commended his goaltender, Craig Pantano, following the win.
“I thought both goalies played well, I did,” said Dennehy. “I thought their guy was seeing pucks and made some good saves. We came around with our goalies {and told them} sometimes you only need to make one difference-making save in a game, the game-winner, and you never know when that’s going to be. Craig did a good job of that, they got some good looks and he made the saves when he needed to.”
Lowell head coach Norm Bazin agreed with Dennehy’s assessment that either team could have won, but gave credit to the Warriors for playing a strong game. Bazin also suggested that the Riverhawks will need to limit Merrimack’s shot count on Saturday in order to force a game-three.
“It wasn’t what we’re looking for,” said Bazin. “We got a good opponent, they played hard. Obviously they had the last one. I thought we had some glimpses of positive play throughout the game, but they played a good road game. We gave up 40 shots and that’s not something we do very often at home.”
