LOWELL, Mass.-A shootout-winning goal from junior Carl Berglund (Hammaro, Sweden) earned the No. 15 UMass Lowell men's hockey team (8-2-3, 6-1-1 Hockey East) the extra point in the Hockey East standings after drawing a 4-4 tie against No. 14 Massachusetts (7-4-2, 5-2-2 HEA) Friday night in front of an electric crowd of 6,289 at the Tsongas Center.
Three River Hawks finished the night with multi-point games in the high-scoring Kennedy Cup clash. Leading the charge, freshman Matt Crasa (South Setauket, N.Y.) scored a pair of goals against the Minutemen, including a power play goal late in the second. In the assist column, senior Lucas Condotta (Georgetown, Ontario) and sophomore Ben Meehan (Walpole, Mass.) dished out two helpers in the contest to finish with two points.
In net, senior Owen Savory (Cambridge, Ontario) made 27 saves across the 65 minutes of play. He also kept UMass scoreless in the shootout to hand the River Hawks the extra point in the conference standings.
UMass Lowell claimed an 8-5 edge in shots to open the game, but it was the Minutemen that struck first. With just over five minutes left in the first period, UMass' Ryan Lautenbach broke the scoring stalemate to take the 1-0 lead heading into the first break.
Coming off the intermission, UMass found the back of the net once again, scoring just 4:20 into the second to extend their margin to 2-0 over the home squad.
UMass Lowell quickly turned the tides in its favor, scoring three unanswered goals to close out the third with a 3-2 lead. After UMass' Matt Murray denied a shot on the doorstep from Meehan, sophomore Matt Allen (Minco, Okla.) picked up the rebound and sent it past a sprawled Murray to slice the Minutemen's lead in half.
A flurry of penalties against the visitors gave the River Hawks a critical 5-on-3 power play opportunity with less than five left in the second. Getting the cross from junior Ryan Brushett (Montreal, Quebec), senior Reid Stefanson (Winnipeg, Manitoba) smacked in a one-timer past the glove of Murray to even the score.
Less than a minute later, the River Hawks continued to capitalize on the extra-man opportunity. After a shot from Condotta ricocheted off the pad of the Minuteman netminder, Crasa was quick to get the second touch and knock in the shot to send the River Hawks to the second intermission with a 3-2 lead.
UMass retaliated just over two minutes into the third as Anthony Del Gaizo took advantage of a UMass Lowell penalty to lock the teams up once more. Ten minutes later, it was Crasa once again for the River Hawks, as he picked up another Condotta rebound and tucked it behind the skate of Murray for the 4-3 edge.
Unwilling to give up the win, the Minutemen's Del Gaizo scored once again with only 1:27 left in the game to force the extra frame.
With just a combined three shots in the five-minute overtime period, the teams headed to the shootout to decide the extra point. With the first Minutemen attempts failing to light the lamp, Berglund was the final River Hawk to take a shot. With a quick shot, the Swedish forward slid the puck under the skate of Murray for the shootout win.
With their eyes on the sweep, the River Hawks travel west to Amherst tomorrow night to close out the home-and-home with the Minutemen at the Mullins Center at 7:30 p.m.
