Crimson find redemption in Saints
Men’s hockey squeeze out SLU to advance to ECACHL semifinals
In the latest leg of this season’s ECAC Hockey League title run, a best-of-three quarterfinal series against visiting St. Lawrence University on March 10-12, the Harvard men’s hockey team took a bad spill, got up, and then proceeded to dust the competition. For the resilient and then-some Crimson, the redemptive powers of beating the Saints 3-2 and 8-4 in the second and deciding contests, respectively, ought to put a strut in their skates heading into Friday’s (March 17) conference semifinal against Dartmouth.
Harvard’s eight-goal output in Sunday’s (March 12) deciding game marked a season high for the home team (19-11-2): a daring comeback following the Crimson’s lone-goal effort in the series opener on Friday (March 10). In that game, the fifth-seeded Saints (21-17-2) weighed down the hosts, 5-1, thanks largely to the net skills of St. Lawrence’s Justin Pesony. The sophomore grabbed 31 saves on the evening, including 18 in the final period.
![Dan Murphy](https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/wp-content/uploads/2006/03/7-menshockey1-450-1.jpg)
Things began to tip in Harvard’s favor the following night when Dave Watters ’08 tallied the eventual game-winner with 2:26 remaining to edge the visitors, 3-2, forcing Sunday’s tiebreaker. In that third and final game, Watters immediately picked up where he left off, tallying Harvard’s first of three opening-period goals just 25 seconds in. Then, at 15:22, senior Dan Murphy started out his hat trick to extend the Crimson lead to 2-0. And though St. Lawrence closed out the period down a manageable 3-1, Harvard continued the onslaught in the middle frame, outgunning the Saints by six shots (19 to 13) to take a 6-2 advantage.
Next up, No. 4 Harvard will have to get through No. 1 Dartmouth, the 2006 ECACHL regular season champs, on Friday for a chance to advance to the ECACHL title game against either Colgate or reigning champion Cornell the following day. Also on Friday, the Crimson women – newly declared ECACHL champs – visit No. 1-ranked New Hampshire in the first round of the 2006 NCAA tournament. Visit http://www.gocrimson.com for all the scores.