Niagara and Robert Morris served up a bruising prelude to next week’s CHA tournament, where these same teams will meet in the opening round of play in Grand Rapids, Minn.<\/p>\n
Saturday, the Purple Eagles prevailed by a 3-1 margin, but the game was not decided until the final moments after Sean Bentivoglio redirected a clearing pass from a frenzied Robert Morris attack and raced in on the empty net.<\/p>\n
Bentivoglio could have easily salted the game away but he chose instead to wait for senior Ryan Gale to join the play. In a classy gesture amongst teammates, Bentivoglio gifted Gale his last goal at Dwyer Arena, and so concluded a turbulent regular season for the Purple Eagles.<\/p>\n
“It’s Senior Night, and Ryan’s having a helluva year. He’s put in four hard years here and I thought he deserved the puck,” Bentivoglio said. “We’ve lost a lot of tight games this year. We just need to put 60 minutes together and that’s something we are working on.”<\/p>\n
Niagara head coach Dave Burkholder was not anxious at the prospect of having to face the Colonials again for the third time in a week. “I was certainly impressed by the way Robert Morris played this whole weekend,” he said. “They stuck to their system and their goaltender (Christian Boucher) was just outstanding.”<\/p>\n
A flurry of penalties opened the contest, yet neither team could get the jump on the man advantage. Midway through the period, Niagara scored after Barrett Ehgoetz, who has made a record-shattering career of creating chances behind the opposition’s net, feathered a beautiful pass to linemate Cliff Ketchen in the slot for the tally.<\/p>\n
Niagara scored again in the second when Kris Wiebe beat Boucher on an innocent-looking wrist shot through the pads. Wiebe, however, could not stand his prosperity and shortly thereafter took a major penalty when he was whistled out of the game for hitting from behind.<\/p>\n
Robert Morris failed to capitalize despite excellent puck movement on the power play. Boucher kept Niagara from blowing the game open when he robbed Niagara forward Matt Carruana with a scissors pad save on the setup from Bentivoglio.<\/p>\n
The Colonials did cash in on the power play in the third after Jeff Gilbert sent a blast from the point past Niagara goalie Jeff Van Nynatten. Gilbert was a force throughout the contest and his timely goal stoked the Colonials’ confidence.<\/p>\n
From that moment on, the game turned into a high-octane affair with end-to-end rushes by both teams, and another crucial save by Boucher on a Gale look from in front of the net. <\/p>\n
Van Nynatten was equal to the task and made key saves as well, not the least of which featured the bizarre occurrence of the puck disappearing — literally — into Van Nynatten’s padding, as it could not be found for the ensuing faceoff.<\/p>\n
Robert Morris attempted desperately to tie the game, pulling Boucher for the extra attacker with 1:10 remaining. The Colonials bottled up Niagara but could not get a second look at the Niagara net before Bentivoglio served Gale his departing shot.<\/p>\n
Niagara and Robert Morris will meet again this Friday in the opening round of the CHA playoffs.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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