WALTHAM, Mass. - No. 14 University of Massachusetts hockey used a four-goal second period to secure its first win of the season on the road at Bentley, 5-4, on Saturday night at The Bentley Arena. The victory for the Minutemen (1-0-0) marks the 150th career win for head coach Greg Carvel in his UMass tenure.
"I thought Bentley came out with really good pace and it took us about half a period to get our legs going and I really liked our game from there," said Carvel. "We go into the third with a four-goal lead and get punched late, but the thing I liked the best is we had five new players who didn't play for us last year and they all looked, to me, like really positive additions."
Sophomore Aydar Suniev opened the scoring 5:38 into the first period, putting home a rebound from an Owen Murray shot from the perimeter at the top of the crease. Freshman Larry Keenan collected the secondary helper for his first collegiate point.
The Falcons leveled the score at 1-1 at the 2;12 mark of the second period when Nick Bochen's wrister from Garrett Horsager found its way through traffic.
Less than two minutes later, Suniev put the Minutemen back on top, 2-1, with a one-timer from junior Cole O'Hara and sophomore Dans Locmelis for his second of the night.
Sophomore Jack Musa pushed the margin to 3-1, knocking in a rebound from freshman Finn Loftus and junior Kenny Connors at 8:10, Loftus' first collegiate point.
Freshman Daniel Jencko then buried his first of his career in the slot from seniors Lucas Mercuri and Ryan Lautenbach 11:46 into the frame.
Suniev then completed his hat trick going bar down at the 16:55 mark with Murray and Locmelis both earning their second assists of the night on the play.
Bentley took one of the goals back in the opening moments of the third to cut its deficit to 5-2 with a tally from Ryan Mansfield. The Falcons later scored a pair in the final minute of the contest, including a power-play, extra attacker goal from A.J. Hodges that made the final score, 5-4.
The teams finished even in shots at 37 apiece, while UMass was 0-for-4 on the power play and Bentley went 1-for-4.
Sophomore Michael Hrabal totaled 33 saves in net for the Minutemen and Connor Hasley had 32 stops for the Falcons.
UMass will be back in action tomorrow, October 6, when the squad will host Rensselaer in an exhibition matchup at the Mullins Center at 3 p.m.
