The St. Lawrence University Men’s Ice Hockey team had two thrilling games over the weekend on Friday and Saturday night at Appleton Arena, taking on a Ferris State team who was ranked fourth in the nation coming into the weekend. On Friday night, the Saints started off strong stemming from an opening minute tally from Junior Brian Ward. This opening lead would last until more than halfway through the second period with the help of strong defensive play, particularly from Freshman goaltender Kyle Hayton.
After stopping all 19 shots Hayton would face in the first, he then went on to stop a total of 44 over the course of the game, including some incredible saves which brought the crowd to their feet with a roar. After Ferris State tied the game late in the second, the two teams went into the final frame tied up at a score of 1-1. Midway through the third, Ferris State was able to get a rare shot past Hayton, to put the Saints down by one. With the minutes on the clock ticking down and less than six minutes to go in the game, the Saints were able to again make this tight contest a tie game at 2-2 with a goal from Tommy Thompson, assisted by Ben Masella and Brian Ward. The crowd erupted and the momentum again appeared to be on our side.
With regulation coming to a close, the Saints looked to force overtime by killing off a game saving penalty and carrying momentum with them into the extra frame. A back and forth first couple minutes of overtime, Ferris State forward Chad McDonald scored on a great shot from below the circles to end the game, giving Ferris state the win, and St. Lawrence the difficult and hard fought loss, 3-2.
The next night would be a different story. The Saints looked for redemption following the tough defeat the night before, and again came out strong with an early goal coming from Freshman Mitch Eden, less than five minutes into the game. This time the Saints would never let go of their lead. The score would remain 1-0 until more than midway through the third, again with the help of strong play from Kyle Hayton keeping the puck out of the net. With eight minutes to go in the game and the tension tight in the one goal game, Senior Justin Bruckel forced a turnover in the Ferris state defensive zone, and fed it to fellow classmate, Patrick Doherty who put it in the net to give the Saints a two-goal cushion. This ultimately sealed the deal on a shutout win for the Saints, with a final score of 2-0.
The Men Ice Hockey team heads to Ohio next weekend to face another strong out of conference team, the Miami Redhawks, for two games before coming back to the Canton-Potsdam area for a home and away meeting with rival Clarkson the following weekend.