Princeton men’s hockey (6–12–2 overall, 5–7–1 ECAC) saw mixed results this past weekend. The Tigers defeated Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (12–17–3, 7–9–0) by a score 3–2 on Friday night, but fell 7–3 to Union College (10–14–3, 7–8–1) on Saturday.
The Tigers are now in ninth place in the Eastern College Athletic Conference (ECAC) with playoffs approaching.
In their opening game of the weekend, the Tigers dominated the second period with three goals, pulling ahead to secure the win.
In the first period, the Tigers fell behind 1–0 after the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute’s (RPI) forward Justin Adammo buried a rebound on the power play. While neither team scored for the remainder of the period, the RPI Engineers outshot the Tigers 9–7.
Midway through the second period, Princeton answered with a power-play goal of their own. Junior defenseman Pito Walton wristed a shot from the high slot through traffic with assists from sophomore forward Adam Robbins and senior defenseman Mark Paolini. Walton’s goal knotted the game at 1–1. RPI answered right back, as junior defenseman Simon Kjellberg found a loose puck and tucked it in just 1:36 after Walton’s goal to make it 2–1.
Undeterred, sophomore forward Ian Murphy followed up a breakaway chance with a tap in goal with assists from senior forward Corey Andonovski and junior forward Spencer Kersten. Murphy’s shot tied the game 2–2 for the Tigers. A mere 1:36 later, assisted by Andonovski and Kersten, senior forward Christian O’Neill cleaned up a loose puck at the side of the net on the power play to put the Tigers ahead 3–2.
The score stayed the same for the remainder of the game as senior goalie Jeremie Forget, who had 21 saves on 23 shots, shut down the Engineers in the third period. The win helped the Tigers close the gap on RPI in ECAC standings, where they are now just four points behind the 6th place Engineers.
Saturday’s game against the Dutchmen was not successful compared to Friday’s victory over RPI. Princeton could not build off the momentum of the previous night’s win, resulting in a 7–3 loss. The Tigers and the Dutchmen played a chippy game that saw 17 combined penalties between the two teams — 11 against Union and six against Princeton.
The Dutchmen opened the scoring when junior defenseman Dylan Anhorn picked the corner for a one-goal lead. The Tigers promptly answered when Robbins put one through a screen, assisted by Andonovsky and first year defenseman Noah de la Durantaye, on the power play to tie the game one-all.
Still, Union led the rest of the way. Just 28 seconds after Princeton’s goal, junior forward Gabriel Seger received a perfect pass and squeaked it past Forget to reclaim the lead 2–1. Towards the end of the first period, sophomore forward Tyler Watkins scored a backhander on a breakaway to widen the score gap 3–1.
In the first minute of the second period, Kersten and Murphy had a mini two-on-one break finished off by Kersten with assists from Murphy and first year defenseman David Ma to cut the lead to 3–2. Shortly after, Union doubled their lead when Christian Sanda roofed a wrister to make it 4–2.
With about eight minutes to go in the period, the penalty onslaught began. After a hit from Murphy, the Dutchmen began a sequence of penalty-inducing hits in retaliation. In between these penalties, Princeton senior forward Luke Keenan found a rebound in front and buried it to cut the Union lead to 4–3. However, after yet another Union penalty, Anhorn received the puck shorthanded and flew down the ice and scored unassisted for his second goal of the game, pulling 5–3.
At the start of the third period, the Tigers had a power play but were unable to score. The Dutchmen followed up the kill with two more goals from Graf and sophomore forward Chaz Smedsrud to give Union a 7–3 victory.
The Tigers will look to continue their push up in the ECAC standing on Tuesday when they host Yale at Hobey Baker Rink.
Ben Burns is an Associate Sports Editor at the ‘Prince’ who typically covers basketball, hockey, and soccer. He can be reached at bwburns@princeton.edu or on Twitter @bwburns5_.
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