The Massachusetts hockey team shook off the frustration and deflation of Friday night’s loss against Merrimack College to bounce back and snag a Hockey East win. UMass (11-10-2, 4-7-2 HEA) dominated the Warriors (9-12-1, 5-7-1 HEA) offensively in a 5-2 win.
“I think [Saturday night] was pretty dominant, I think our start was outstanding,” head coach Greg Carvel said. “We talked a lot about getting to the net.”
Cole O’Hara tallied four points on three goals and one assist. With under 10 minutes of the first period, the junior forward opened scoring for the night.
Lucas Ölvestad stayed close in on the boards to find Jack Musa in the offensive zone. With the Warriors covering Musa, he sent a clean pass to O’Hara making his way out of the neutral zone. From the circle on Merrimack goaltender Max Lundgren’s left, he took a low shot. The puck bounced off Lungren’s left pad and slowly took a bounce over it to make its way perfectly behind the crease.
Nearly halfway through the second period, he put the Minutemen up 3-0 with a power play goal from Dans Locmelis and Kenny Connors.
Connors controlled the puck along the boards, swinging it around to connect with Locmelis just behind the net. O’Hara snuck up on Lungren’s left and retrieved the bounce off the back of the net. A tap sealed the deal with under a minute remaining of the man-advantage.
His third goal happened on another power play halfway through the third period from a strong shot ringing around behind Lungren.
This marked O’Hara’s tenth, eleventh and twelfth goals for the Minutemen at a key point in the season where they were scratching for an HEA win.
Just minutes after O’Hara’s initial goal, assistant captain Lucas Mercuri doubled UMass’ lead on their first power play.
Up the middle, Francesco Dell’Elce found O’Hara in Lundgren’s right at the top edge of the circle. O’Hara quickly got the puck off his stick to meet Mercuri in front of the net. With Lungren focusing on blocking the right side of the net, Mercuri lightly tapped the puck past his leg pad to tally a second, slow moving goal.
“I think we got our chances [on Friday], they just kind of didn’t go our way [on the power play],” O’Hara said. “[Saturday] we kind of prioritized getting the puck to the net a lot more, just getting lucky bounces which is good [that] we got them.”
UMass dominated the first period offensively despite Merrimack’s shot total trailing just behind eight to 10. While the defense controlled the puck, forced turnovers and blocked shots and passes, the Minutemen composed themselves in the offensive zone to set up quick plays.
Locmelis intended to connect with Owen Murray. Murray had a clear shot at net Lundgren’s left as he was just a second slow to transition over from the right. Fired up with momentum to put UMass up on the board, the puck slid slightly past him out of controllable reach. Merrimack collected itself and barred Murray from his opportunity.
On the penalty kill, Musa took an offensively minded aggressive approach to kill off time and scramble up the Warriors.
The sophomore raced down the sheet three seconds into the penalty kill. While trying to beat four Warriors, Musa had no opening to pass to Connors skating up the middle and was clogged up in the corner to put a fourth on the board for the Minutemen.
UMass was successful on all fronts of special teams from capitalizing on three of four power plays and creating havoc on all four penalty kills to keep the Warriors off the board.
Defensively, Jackson Irving and the Minutemen only allowed Warriors’ assistant captain Tyler Young to sink in two goals in the third period on 28 total shots in the game.
The Minutemen stay home at the Mullins Center to take on the University of Alaska Fairbanks on Friday, Jan. 24 and Saturday, Jan. 25. Puck drop on Friday against the Polar Bears is slated for 7 p.m. and can be watched on ESPN+.
“We weren’t too pleased with our game [Friday] and the biggest thing was we wanted to get on [Merrimack] early,” O’Hara said. “I think we sustained that for a full 60 [minutes].”
Sydney Ciano can be reached at [email protected] and followed on Twitter/X @SydneyCiano.
