As is often the case within the ECAC Men’s Hockey League, the last weekend was needed to determine the final seeding for the league playoffs. RPI’s team was no exception, as the weekend determined whether they would be home or on the road for the first round. The team split the weekend, going 6-5 and 3-4 against Brown and Yale, respectively, which led to a ninth place finish in the league and a first-round on-the-road series against No. 8 seed Colgate.
The start of Friday night’s game set the tone for the games played this weekend at Houston Field House: rife with calls from referees and dictated by special teams. With RPI up on the power play, the Bears of Brown University managed to take possession and skate in on sophomore goaltender Mathias Lange. Firing a quick shot, the puck went in net and quickly ricocheted out. Referee Frank Murphy, however, missed its entrance and with no whistle blown, play continued until Brown goalie Dan Rosen was forced to make a save in front of his net. Finally alerted of the situation, Murphy then conducted lengthy discussions with both benches and the goal judge, finally allowing the goal and putting time back on the clock.
The remainder of that first period would be marked by RPI tying the score, Brown taking another lead, and RPI once again knotting up the score. All three of these goals came on a power-play as Murphy had a quick whistle, calling nine minors in the period; he would call a total of 24 penalties throughout the game.
RPI broke the game open in the second and third periods, at one point taking a commanding 6-3 lead. They would, however, later allow a second short-handed goal and an even strength goal, allowing Brown to pull within one goal during the last six minutes of play. Despite Brown’s decision to opt for an extra attacker and an open net for the final 58 seconds, the Engineers held on for the win with a 6-5 final score.
Senior captain Kirk MacDonald scored two goals and was credited for one assist. Head Coach Seth Appert explained, “On Friday night, Kirk MacDonald got past the 100-point milestone in his career,” calling it “a heck of an achievement.” He added that the team generated a great deal of offense, but did not fare as well when it came to defense.
After the win on Friday night, the Engineers were looking to sweep the weekend on Saturday night; after all, RPI had swept the Bulldogs of Yale and the Brown Bears at their home rinks the last time the teams met this season. In addition, Saturday was Senior Night. Prior to the game, the Engineers’ six graduating seniors were all individually recognized and honored: forwards MacDonald, Oren Eizenman, and Kevin Broad, and defensemen Jake Luthi, Tommy Green, and Ryan Swanson.
Unfortunately, less-than-stellar play by RPI, an aggressively played game by Yale, and what some fans saw as a bias coming from referee Peter Feola led to a disappointing loss for the home team. Appert explained that the referees are “out there trying to represent the league” as best they can and that the officiating has been very good on the whole. He added, however, that there can be “game-to-game” variations as just as a team can have a bad night, a referee may also have less-than-perfect night at times.
Once again, RPI would start the game by being the first to see the penalty box, the first call coming at just 1:49 into the first. Less than 30 seconds later, Yale converted its man advantage to a goal, beating Lange. Despite two Yale penalties, the Engineers would not even out the score for almost another 16 minutes. With 1:40 left in the first, Green scored his first goal of the season, with the assist coming from freshman defenseman Peter Merth.
The tie did not last long, as RPI’s Swanson was called on a hook 44 seconds later. Nine seconds later, Bill LeClerc fired the puck past Lange. Immediately following that goal, Head Coach Seth Appert replaced Lange with Junior Jordan Alford who did not see any shots for the duration of the period.
Appert explained that he wanted to give Lange a chance at the weekend sweep as he played very well at Clarkson and did well against Brown on Friday night. He added that the team was “trying to get some stronger consistency” in net as playoffs were only one week away and that both Lange and Alford have been very good this season.
Just 1:29 into the second period, Yale furthered their lead with a 4-on-3 goal that beat Alford, making the score 3-1. Not long after that goal, it seemed to several fans that RPI managed to fire the puck past Yale netminder Matt Modelski. The puck, however, had quickly bounced back from the net after hitting the pipe; neither light was lit by the goal judge, no whistle was blown, and play continued. Appert explained that after having looked at video footage after the game, he felt Feola had made the right call as the puck did not seem to have gone in the net.
Despite a double minor by Yale junior defenseman Robert Page for both roughing and slashing and a third minor called against another Bulldog, RPI was unable to score in the second. In fact, through the game, Yale killed off all eight of the Engineers’ power plays. The final goal of the second came with four seconds left and allowed Yale to seemingly seal the game as the score was then 4-1.
RPI fought back hard in the third. It was, however, too little, too late. Despite a goal by Luthi 16 seconds into the third, freshman Christian Jensen’s first career goal at 13:09, and an extra attacker for the last 82 seconds of the game, the Engineers were unable to force overtime.
Appert said that the play by the team this weekend was pretty good overall and that they are looking forward to the first round playoff series. This weekend, the team will travel to Hamilton, N.Y. to play that best-of-three series against the Colgate Raiders. While the Engineers have posted a 2-1 record against the Raiders this year, all three of the games were what Appert called “tightly contested [and] very competitive.” The winner of the series will then most likely face St. Lawrence University or Clarkson University in the quarterfinals the following weekend.
