Princeton’s 6-3 win over Yale resulted in two unhappy teams.<\/p>\n
The Bulldogs (0-9, 0-7 ECACHL) remain winless and were frustrated to lose control of a game that was for a while within their reach. Yale outshot Princeton (4-4-1, 4-3 ECACHL) 28-23 and was within two goals or less for the first 39:45.<\/p>\n
“This is a little bit more difficult than the losses we were taking earlier in the season,” said sophomore defenseman Bill LeClerc, who scored one of Yale’s goals. “[Before] we were just playing poorly. [Tonight] we played well the first two periods and then struggled to put it together to win the game.”<\/p>\n
Princeton, on the other hand, was disappointed in its lack of discipline. Numerous penalties set the team back, and Yale was 2-for-8 on the power play.<\/p>\n
“We’re not disciplined now,” Head Coach Guy Gadowsky said. “We’re not playing smart hockey, which is really surprising to me because they’re such incredibly bright individuals. … I am surprised that we can’t do a better job with staying out of the box.”<\/p>\n
Concerned about the Tigers’ parade to the penalty box, Gadowsky called a time out at 7:40 of the second period after Tigers forward Kevin Westgarth went off for holding the stick, Princeton’s fifth straight penalty.<\/p>\n
“We just got to bear down and be more disciplined,” said defenseman Luc Paquin, who had four assists.<\/p>\n
Soon after the penalty expired, Bulldogs forward Blair Yaworski went in on a breakaway on Princeton goalie Eric Leroux, but Leroux closed the five-hole in time for Yaworski’s shot.<\/p>\n
At 11:04, with Princeton on its first power play of the night, Yale goalie Peter Cohen kept the Tigers off the scoreboard when he stoned Sproat with a glove save. Sproat skated away, shaking his head.<\/p>\n
“I thought Peter played excellent for us,” LeClerc said.<\/p>\n
Yale killed off the penalty uneventfully, but things would not go as smoothly on their next penalty kill, as Sebastian Borza zipped a shot from the slot past Cohen to open up a 3-1 Princeton lead.<\/p>\n
And with 15 seconds to go in the period, Tigers forward Keith Shattenkirk scored off the rebound of a Paquin shot for his first collegiate goal. It gave Princeton a stranglehold on the game, and the tally stood up to be the game-winner.<\/p>\n
In the third period the two teams traded goals. Tigers defenseman Mike Moore scored his first collegiate goal at 3:48 on the power play. His shot from the point sailed through a sea of players before reaching the net.<\/p>\n
Bulldogs defenseman Rob Page responded with a first goal of his own. While on the power play, he received a Joe Zappala pass and shot the puck from the top of the circle, tucking it just inside the left post at 10:40.<\/p>\n
Then at 14:56, Tigers’ Neil Stevenson-Moore picked up a loose puck during a goal-mouth scramble and backhanded it into the net for his third goal in three games and his fourth point in four games.<\/p>\n
“Our first four games we had one line that was doing everything, so we all challenged ourselves to do something,” Stevenson-Moore said. “It felt really good to get a couple of goals. It’s a big relief.”<\/p>\n
Top scoring forward Christian Jensen rounded out the scoring for Yale at 18:29. His goal from a quick shot from the slot was assisted by junior forward Nate Jackson.<\/p>\n
Princeton’s top scorers got off to a quick start. Grant Goeckner-Zoeller, tied for first on the team in scoring with 15 points, rushed down the left wing on a breakaway, deked and beat Cohen on the backhand at 9:45. The sophomore finished the game with a goal and two assists, and Paquin got his first of four assists on Goeckner-Zoeller’s goal. Paquin’s 1.67 points per game is tops among the nation’s defensemen.<\/p>\n
“As a defenseman, you don’t need to put rockets on net,” Paquin said. “You just try and get it there and create some rebounds for the forwards. You’re going to get your bounces.”<\/p>\n
“Luc’s been great all year,” Gadowsky said. “He is a very intelligent hockey player and plays like he loves the game. He’s fun to watch.”<\/p>\n
Yale got some offensive momentum later in the period, creating several quality scoring chances on the power play with Dustin Sproat off for holding the stick at 11:59. However, Leroux held the Bulldogs off the scoreboard, allowing Princeton to later open up a 2-0 lead.<\/p>\n
Paquin took a slap shot from the hash marks; Cohen slowed the puck, but it trickled through his legs and lay in the crease. Sproat, the ECAC Player of the Week, deposited the stationary puck into a wide-open net for his eighth goal of the season at 17:42.<\/p>\n
But Yale regrouped, as Moore went to the penalty box for interference just 14 seconds after the goal. The Bulldogs capitalized on the power play at 19:00 as Shawn Mole passed the puck across the slot to LeClerc, who one-timed it past Leroux to cut the lead in half.<\/p>\n
Westgarth almost answered for Princeton 10 seconds later, but his shot from the top of the circle rang off the pipe.<\/p>\n
Princeton and Yale will face each other again on Saturday in New Haven, Conn. Yale hopes so split the home-and-home series.<\/p>\n
“We’re obviously struggling in a lot of areas,” Bulldogs Head Coach Tim Taylor said. “We haven’t had any wins. I was proud of our work ethic and our effort, and we didn’t quit. We have to keep at it.”<\/p>\n
The Tigers will look to not repeat their mistakes. They acknowledged that Yale may make them pay for it next time.<\/p>\n
“They worked really hard,” Paquin said. “They got all over us in the first period. They’re in a rebuilding situation right now, but we can’t take them too lightly. If we give them a chance to gain some confidence they could surprise anybody. They’re hungry for a win right now.”<\/p>\n
“I think they’re going to be fine because they have some very skilled players,” Gadowsky said of Yale. “They have some speed, and it seems like they’re getting a bad bounce here and there that happens to be killing them at a wrong time. Once the puck starts rolling their way they can be a dangerous hockey team.”<\/p>\n
“I’m very curious to see how we come out,” Gadowsky said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Princeton’s 6-3 win over Yale resulted in two unhappy teams. The Bulldogs (0-9, 0-7 ECACHL) remain winless and were frustrated to lose control of a game that was for a while within their reach. Yale outshot Princeton (4-4-1, 4-3 ECACHL) 28-23 and was within two goals or less for the first 39:45. “This is a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":22374,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"coauthors":[],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp-admin.uscho.com\/recaps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5709"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp-admin.uscho.com\/recaps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp-admin.uscho.com\/recaps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp-admin.uscho.com\/recaps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp-admin.uscho.com\/recaps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5709"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/wp-admin.uscho.com\/recaps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5709\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp-admin.uscho.com\/recaps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22374"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp-admin.uscho.com\/recaps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5709"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp-admin.uscho.com\/recaps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5709"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp-admin.uscho.com\/recaps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5709"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp-admin.uscho.com\/recaps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=5709"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}