The men’s hockey team defeated Rensselaer in a 5-3 nail biter on Friday. The following day, a three-goal rally in the third period forced overtime against No. 9 Union, which ended in a 3-3 draw. With strong showings in the last two weeks, the Tigers seem to be finding their stride after winning only two of their first 10 games.
“It takes time to get to know each other and pick up [and] adjust to different styles of play,” freshman forward Aaron Kesselman said. “We’re trying to click more. We just had the best week of practice collectively and that helped us this weekend against RPI and Union.”
The Tigers (4-7-2 overall, 3-5-1 ECAC Hockey) and Rensselaer traded leads in the first two periods. After the second, the teams were even at 3-3. Sophomore forward Andrew Calof scored Princeton’s fourth goal, his second of the game, and sophomore forward Jack Berger guaranteed a win with a shot on empty cage in the final minute of the third period.
Jacob Laliberte scored his first career goal and put the Engineers (3-12, 1-6) on the scoreboard in the seventh minute. RPI had skated the puck into its offensive zone in the opening minutes of the game and maintained control of shooting opportunities. Sophomore goaltender Sean Bonar thwarted almost a dozen rapid-fire attempts on goal before Laliberte skated onto the doorstep and gave the Engineers an unassisted 1-0 lead.
Berger and the rest of the Tigers found more shooting and faceoff opportunities after the deficit. Calof won his faceoff on the right side of Rensselaer’s cage and fed the puck to sophomore defender Kevin Ross. Freshman defender Kevin Mills waited for a pass across the blue line and slammed the puck towards RPI goaltender Bryce Merriam’s cage. Berger channeled the puck into the net at 11 minutes, 15 seconds, tying the score 1-1.
Princeton scored again on a power play just two minutes later when junior forward Rob Kleebaum picked up an assist from Berger. The Tigers went on the power play at 13:13 as RPI’s left wing Mark McGowan received a two-minute penalty for boarding. Kleebaum used a lifter shot on Merriam to take the lead.
But the Engineers tied the game again in the 17th minute. Forward Matt Tinordi made an odd man rush with left wing Josh Rabbani after defenseman Nick Bailen brought the puck into the zone. Rabbani handled the puck just inside the circle, then shot a pass to Tinordi behind the goal. Tinordi tipped it from behind and created a 2-2 tie.
At 7:13 in the second period, Calof put the Tigers back in the lead, scoring off a feed from sophomore forward Andrew Ammon after two of Ammon’s shots were stopped. But RPI see-sawed the game into its favor after a referee review near the end of the period. Right wing C.J. Lee skated down the ice and slammed the puck inside the zone from the left side. Bonar stopped the puck as both teams fought for possession, but it slightly slid behind the goal line under pressure before the whistle was blown, and the referees confirmed the 3-3 tie.
Just as he had in the second period, Calof scored in the eighth minute of the final frame. After senior forward Marc Hagel, Mills and Kleebaum took shots, freshman forward Tyler Maugeri picked up the puck from Ross at the blue line and sent it to Calof. Calof tipped the puck into the back of the net, earning his third goal of the season and the winning goal of the game. The Engineers pulled their goalie for an extra player with two mintues left, and Bonar didn’t need to make any saves before Berger intercepted the puck in the offensive zone and buried it into the empty net, making the final score 5-3.
Bonar finished the game with 28 saves and made the most in the first period, when RPI took several shots on goal in the opening minutes. Merriam made just 19 saves throughout the game. The Engineers outshot Princeton 31-24, but the Tigers used Rensselaer’s turnovers to its advantage.
Sophomores led the Tigers again on Saturday, as Berger scored twice and Ammon once in the third period to take an unlikely point from Union (7-3-5, 3-2-2). Beginning early in the final period, Princeton rescued itself from a 3-0 deficit in front of around 2,000 fans at Baker Rink.
The Dutchmen earned a two-goal advantage in the first period, as they have in most of their games this season. Forward Trevor Mingoia picked up the puck from teammates forwards Jeremy Welsh and Kevin Sullivan at the blue line in the 11th minute and shot it over Bonar’s shoulder. Two minutes later, forward Brian Yanovitch skated into the middle of open ice inside the Tigers’ zone. After entering a two-on-one with forward Mark Bennett, Yanovitch shot between Bonar’s pads on the backhand and put Union up 2-0.
Welsh extended the Dutchmen’s lead to 3-0 midway through the next frame. Sullivan fed the puck to Welsh on the left post, and Welsh tapped the puck into the net.
But Princeton skated onto the ice a completely new team after the second period. Ammon barely slipped the puck past Union goalie Colin Stephens less than three minutes into the third. Berger continued the rally in the 10th minute, just seconds after the end of a power play. Senior defender Derrick Pallis and Calof skated up the right side and fought for an opening at the blue line. Berger snatched the puck from the pile up and skated past Union’s goalie, closing the deficit to just one goal.
With just one minute and 14 seconds remaining, Mills skated down to the right corner and sent a cross ice pass to Maugeri. Maugeri tapped the puck to Berger who slammed the puck in on the right side. The teams went into a five-minute overtime, but neither team broke the 3-3 tie.
“We’ve gone down first in a lot of our games this season, which is never a good thing,” Kesselman said. “But our comebacks, especially against Union, have showed that deficits aren’t impossible to reverse. We are trying to change that way of playing, though.”
Princeton outshot its ranked opponent 14-2 in the third period and held a 31-17 overall shot advantage. The Tigers went scoreless on five power play chances, while Union went 0-for-2. Bonar made 14 saves while Stevens made 28.
“We are obviously constantly looking for chemistry. That really happened this weekend, especially with the sophomore line,” Kesselman said. “Jack scored four times this weekend and Calof did well, too. They all did.”
The Tigers return to Baker Rink next weekend for an afternoon matchup against ECAC opponent Harvard.
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