NORTH ANDOVER, Mass. — Merrimack and Massachusetts battled in a penalty-filled game Friday night at Lawler Rink that ended in a 4-4 tie.
Shane Walsh’s goal at 12:12 of the third period pulled UMass into the tie.
“I thought we were really good in the first, pretty good in the second,” said Massachusetts coach John Micheletto. “I thought we managed the second period really well. We got much better productivity in the third against a premeir goalie [Rasmus Tirronen] in our conference. I’m happy we were able to score four, [but] we would’ve liked to hold them to three. All things considered, we’ll take the point.”
The first period was dominated mostly by UMass spending much of the time in the Merrimack end. Umass peppered Tirronen with 12 shots in that period, scoring once as Brennan Baxandall fired a shot from the point to put his team ahead 1-0. Anthony Petrella and Ray Pigozzi were credited with the assists.
The second period was filled by a counter from Merrimack scoring three goals to climb ahead.
Jace Hennig got the scoring going for Merrimack just 3:30 into the period on a cross-ice feed from Brett Seney to tie the game 1-1.
The rough stuff continued when Hampus Gustafsson and got into a little scrum and were called for facemasking. Merrimack jumped right back on the scoresheet when Mathieu Tibbet found the back of the net on a tap in to give Merrimack the 2-1 advantage.
The period would end on a Chris LeBlanc goal that would put his club ahead 3-1 going into the final frame.
The Minutemen cut the lead in half when Frank Vatrano jammed a puck in the crease that cut Merrimacks lead to 3-2.
Just eight minutes later, UMass was on the penalty kill when Brandon Montour snapped a shot in the slot shorthanded to tie the game 3-3.
It didn’t take long for Merrimack to answer when just six seconds later, Gustafsson skated down the left wing wall and fired a shot that squeezed past goalie Henry Dill to give Merrimack the 4-3 lead.
Walsh’s game-tying mirrored the way Gustafsson scored.
The game went into overtime with each team getting great scoring chances, especially late in the game when Dill had to make a sprawling save at the buzzer.
Merrimack coach Mark Dennehy wasn’t exactly pleased with his teams’ effort and thought his players didn’t eaxctly play their style of game.
“This isn’t the game that we wanted to play; it’s the game that they wanted to play,” said Dennehy. “I didn’t think we showed up ready to play. We didn’t give UMass enough respect. We did get it going a little bit, but then reverted right back.”
