The Massachusetts hockey team couldn’t produce offense in its 2-1 loss to Providence on Thursday night.
Despite allowing two goals, goaltender Jackson Irving had a strong first collegiate start in net for the Minutemen (4-5-2, 0-3-2 Hockey East). The sophomore goaltender totaled 25 saves, making crucial stops to keep UMass in the game. One of his most notable saves came in the second period as two Providence (7-1-2, 5-0-2 HEA) players came streaking down the ice. As they got close to Irving, they tapped the puck to him in front of the crease and he made a stretch save to cover the puck.
“[Irving] is building a lot of trust, a lot of confidence,” head coach Greg Carvel said. “He played great in Vermont for 50 minutes and I thought he played great tonight. Made some big stops, absolutely. It’s his net for now.”
Freshman Larry Keenan grabbed his first collegiate goal to begin the first period to get the Minutemen on the board early. Cole O’Hara started the play on a behind the back pass along the boards to Aydar Suniev. The sophomore backhanded a pass to Keenan who quickly took a wrist shot on the point to put UMass up 1-0.
“I think just growing, playing with confidence is a huge aspect as a freshman defenseman,” Keenan said about what he wants to do moving forward. “Just keep doing my thing and be confident when I get on this ice.”
The Friars tied the game up later in the first period with over 12 minutes left. Guillame Richard got the puck to Graham Gamache as Lucas Mercuri checked him into the boards. Gamache quickly backhanded the puck to Ryan O’Reilly. The graduate student sent a wrister through traffic past Irving’s left shoulder to tie the game.
To start the second period, the Friars took a lead just over four minutes in the period after Dans Locmelis was whistled for contact to the head. In front of the blue line, Hudson Malinoski stick handled the puck before passing to Logan Sawyer. He quickly shot a one-timer past Irving’s shoulder for his first collegiate goal and Providence’s first lead of the game.
UMass couldn’t find a tying goal despite adding 26 shots on net. The Minutemen forwards added pressure on the Friars but couldn’t seem to add quality shots.
“The biggest issue for us right now is scoring, we haven’t had a goal from our top nine forwards in three games in a row so we need to get that figured out here, I think that’ll help our cause,” Carvel said.
Both goals against were from sustained zone time by the Friars as the Minutemen struggled to clear their defensive zone. With the defense struggling to clear the zone, the offense couldn’t string plays together to pressure Providence.
After Keenan’s goal the Minutemen took two straight penalties, first from Keenan then James Duerr. Despite almost four straight minutes of the penalty kill, special teams stood strong. The UMass penalty kill easily cleared the puck multiple times and took away shooting lanes from Providence.
UMass’ power play challenged the Providence penalty kill but the Minutemen couldn’t get it past goaltender Philip Svedbäck. In the first frame of the game, UMass consistently got shots on the goaltender on the Connor Kelley slashing call. Suniev, O’Hara and Lucas Ölvestad all had goal chances but couldn’t line their shots up to get it by the goaltender.
“The power play [on Thursday] I thought they deserved a goal tonight,” Carvel said. “We need that power play to score one or two goals a game. One goal tonight would have been huge for us and they scored on the power play and we didn’t so to me that’s the difference in the game.”
The Minutemen will play the second game of the series on Saturday, Nov. 16 at 6 p.m. at Schneider Arena. The game can be streamed on ESPN+.
Kayla Gregoire can be reached at [email protected] and followed on X @Kaygregoire.
