The Massachusetts hockey team picked up a 3-1 victory against UNH on Saturday night after leaving Durham with a tie the night before.
“We’re a pretty desperate team, we know what’s on the line right now every single night in Hockey East, so [we] just did a better job holding the fort down,” Owen Murray said.
After the Wildcats (11-14-5, 3-13-4 Hockey East) opened the scoring in the second period, the Minutemen (17-12-3, 8-9-3 HEA) quickly responded with two goals in the next two minutes.
Working the offensive zone, O’Hara took a shot from the right circle. Lucas Ölvestad recovered the puck, and after some back and forth passing, he sent the puck towards the net. UNH netminder Jared Whale squared up to stop the puck, but he could not manage to hold on to it. With momentum, the puck trickled into the blue paint behind him. Owen Murray, positioned to Whale’s left, snapped into action to slam the puck past the red line. The 1-1 equalizer came just 50 seconds after the Wildcats’ goal.
“It’s just desperation…we know what’s at stake and we’ve always rebounded well in tough situations I feel like all year,” Murray said. “Just being a resilient group. Had a good shift there and then followed up with another good one.”
The Wildcats outshot UMass 36-19 through three periods, but Michael Hrabal secured the game for the Minutemen.
“Hrabal will probably decide every game for us the rest of the way, and he did tonight…In the third period, the Wildcats took the game over and we were on our heels, and [Hrabal] made a lot of big saves,” head coach Greg Carvel said. “[He] was the difference tonight.”
The Minutemen earned their first lead of the game in the second period and held onto it for the rest of the night.
Gaining possession at the boards of the defensive zone, Cole O’Hara moved the puck up the ice, working through a defenseman to drive the lane. On a 2-on-1 with Jack Musa, O’Hara took a controlled shot from the right circle and found the space between Whale’s left leg and the right post. The tally secured the lead for the Minutemen and was O’Hara’s third in the past four games.
Through a scoreless first period, the Minutemen looked for offensive opportunities. Their best opportunity came from a shorthanded Kenny Connors breakaway. Connors intercepted a pass and drove up the ice without any UNH defensemen on him, but Whale made a quick move to stop Connors’ shot with his right pad.
Nick Ring gave UNH its only tally on the scoreboard.
Off a pass up the ice from Ryan Conmy, Ring skated up the boards on the right side of the offensive zone with UMass defenseman Kennedy O’Connor. Pushing the puck past O’Connor, Ring moved out in front of the crease and O’Connor lost him. Ring lifted the puck over Hrabal’s pads for a 1-0 Wildcat lead.
As the last few seconds winded down in the third period, Ryan Lautenbach found an empty net goal to ice the game.
The Wildcats lost a pass along the boards of its offensive zone, where Lucas Mercuri managed to chip it up to Lautenbach. Without any UNH players to contest him, Lautenbach brought the puck up the ice and put it away, closing out the score at 3-1.
UMass returns to play on Thursday, Feb. 27 when they face off against UMass Lowell on home ice before making the trip to Tsongas Center for the second match of the series on Saturday, Feb. 29. Puck drops are set for 7 p.m. and both games can be streamed on ESPN+.
Caroline Burge can be reached at [email protected] and followed on X @Caroline_Burge
