The Engineers traveled to Clarkson and St. Lawrence to begin their ECAC season on the road this past weekend. Hot off a three game unbeaten streak—including two consecutive wins—RPI looked to continue this string of victories when they played rival Clarkson on Friday night.
The Golden Knights started the game with a bang with a power play goal at 2:49. Clarkson’s Jean Desrochers one-timed a pass from teammate Jay Latulippe past RPI netminder Nathan Marsters to take the early lead. However, RPI made a strong effort to get their offense going in the first, as shown by their leading in shots 12-9. Their efforts paid off when Conrad Barnes took a pass from Cody Wojdyla and made the one-timer count to score at 19:33. Kevin Croxton tallied the second assist.
Like the beginning of the game, Clarkson began the second period with a flash goal. Golden Knight Chris Blight, who chased a dumped puck into the Engineer’s zone, pressured Marsters into losing control of the puck, which Blight took full advantage of to score at the 0:22 mark while short-handed. Despite the chances RPI had throughout the second, they could not put the puck past Clarkson goalie Dustin Traylen, who kept the Engineers at just one goal through 40 minutes.
RPI’s offense finally came through at 9:14 of the third period, when Croxton took several swings at the puck in front of Traylen to tie the game. Kirk MacDonald followed up Croxton’s goal with one of his own just over a minute later, when he snapped the puck right over Traylen at 10:19 to give Rensselaer their first lead of the game. The game looked pretty much sealed until the Engineers were penalized late in the game, and Clarkson’s Matt Nickerson seized the moment and rifled a loose puck towards Marsters to tie the game at 17:38.
In the dying moments of the game, Nickerson took a penalty that carried on into overtime. This would prove costly; halfway through the overtime period, Clarkson took another penalty to give the Engineers a rare 5-on-3 power play in overtime. RPI made full use of this advantage, as Ben Barr scored the game-winner 3:30 into overtime. Oren Eizenman was fed by Scott Basiuk for a wraparound attempt which fell through, and Barr picked up the puck to score the game winner.
The Engineers traveled to St. Lawrence to face the Saints in the second game of their road trip. Now on a three game winning streak, RPI looked to plow through the Saints, who had not won a game in their last nine.
The Saints took the first goal of the game when St. Lawrence’s Tony Maci fired a puck past a screened Marsters at 13:34 of the first period. Unfortunately, this goal proved to be the game winner, as the Engineers never beat Saint goaltender Mike McKenna.
St. Lawrence scored twice in the second period; the first coming from Jamie Parker at 1:47, and the second coming from Tony Maci at 5:00. Parker’s goal came after he lobbed a rebound over Marsters. Maci’s second of the night came with a slapshot from the point that Marsters never saw on the power play.
St. Lawrence’s T.J. Trevelyan closed out the game’s scoring at 14:36 of the third period. Trevelyan fired his shot past Marsters during another Saints powerplay to bring the final score to 4-0.
The Engineers were outclassed by the Saints, as the 31-20 shots on goal tally looked in favor of St. Lawrence. The Saints, who played desperate hockey, got their first win in nine games while RPI’s four game unbeaten streak was squelched.
The Engineers will be looking to pick up the pace again this weekend when they host the Vermont Catamounts on Friday night and the Dartmouth Big Green on Saturday night. Both games will be at the Houston Field House, and start is at 7 pm.
