Sophomore goaltender Dan Meyers made 13 of his 22 saves in the third period and Massachusetts skated to a 3-1 win over St. Lawrence at Appleton Arena Saturday night.
The Minutemen, now 1-1, snapped St. Lawrence’s two-game win streak to open the season, using tight defense and a couple of offensive breaks to drop the Saints to 2-1 on the season.
“UMass is a very solid team and is coming off an NCAA appearance last season. They are very well-coached and play a tight defensive game. They took away a lot of second and third chances tonight, and really kept a lid on our offense until the third period,” said Saint coach Joe Marsh.
“Our guys put out a lot of effort and played hard, but we couldn’t get to the rebounds at some key times and UMass took advantage of a couple of mistakes on our part and turned them into goals,” Marsh added.
The Minutemen dominated the first period, but couldn’t get the puck past Saint goalie Kain Tisi until Alex Berry picked up a puck which was poked away from a Saint defender in the short slot and walked in one-on-one with the goaltender. Berry buried his first of the year at 17:12 for the game’s first goal, but the Saints had an immediate response.
Junior Casey Parenteau won the draw following the UMass goal and headed to the net. Sophomore Sean Flanagan made a great pass in front and Parenteau tipped it past Minuteman goalie Dan Meyers for his third of the year and a 1-1 tie just 22 seconds after the Minutemen had taken the lead.
“That was important for us because it got us right back in the game,” said Marsh. “That kind of response to a goal is just the kind of thing we are looking for.”
Tisi stopped a penalty shot try by Will Ortiz of the Minutemen with 11:22 to go in the second period to keep it a 1-1 game, but UMass took the lead just under two minutes later when Cory Quick fed freshman Brian Keane on a two-on-one down low after a Saint coverage mistake and Keane tucked the puck between Tisi and the post for his first collegiate goal.
Junior Chris Davis scored a shorthanded goal to give the Minutemen a two-goal cushion at 4:11 of the third, walking in on Tisi after the Saints played the puck with a high stick and hesitated in chasing it down. Tisi got his pad on the shot, but it trickled through and into the back of the net.
St. Lawrence was held to 10 shots through the first two periods and turned up the offensive pressure in the third, but the UMass defense blocked several shots and cleared rebounds from in front of Meyers to protect the lead and the win.
