Icemen Leave Big Red for Dead, 9-1

A message to all the other teams in the ECAC: Don't go to Bright Center.

Grab dinner in the North End. Go see a Patriots game. Maybe even do some shopping.

If you visit Bright this year, you'll have to face the Harvard hockey team. And the way the Crimson played at home this weekend, you might want to hit Filene's instead.

Yesterday afternoon at Bright's friendly confines, Harvard trounced Cornell, 9-1, in front of 3110 spectators. Coupled with an eight-goal output Friday against Colgate, the Crimson tallied 17 goals this weekend.

Captain Lane MacDonald and Nick Carone paced the Harvard attack--which has scored 27 goals in its last three ECAC games--with two goals apiece in the Cornell game.

The victory extended Harvard's winning streak against the Big Red (5-2 overall, 4-2 ECAC, 1-1 Ivy League) to seven games and increased its hold of first place in the ECAC. Harvard (9-0, 8-0, 6-0) stands alone in the league standings, two games ahead of St. Lawrence (10-0, 6-0).

But Harvard has not limited its ECAC success to the standings. The Crimson has the league's best scoring average (6.9 goals per game) and the best defensive average (two goals per game).

End result: the ECAC's most dominant team.

"We could have beaten a lot of teams[yesterday] the way we were skating in the secondand third period," Harvard Coach Bill Cleary said."We played really well, especially after the firstperiod."

Especially after Carone's first goal of thegame. At the 4:51 mark of the second period, thesenior defenseman found a loose puck in the rightside of the zone and took a shot from the circlethat skipped off the glove of Cornell goalieCorrie D'Alessio (24 saves). Harvard led, 2-0, andthe scoring roll call began.

First on the list was Tod Hartje, whoseslapshot fooled D'Alessio and Big Red wing JoeDragon at the 12:08 mark.

MacDonald added his second goal of the gameduring (no surprise here) a Harvard power play offa pass from (again, no surprise) Allen Bourbeauwith 3:10 remaining in the period. The goal, awell-timed slapshot from the lower half of theleft circle, was MacDonald's 10th of the year.

Twenty seconds later, Harvard was up, 5-0, whenTed Donato deflected a Carone shot from the point.

While Harvard celebrated, Cornell watched. TheBig Red could not produce much offensivefirepower. And when it did, Cornell had twoproblems: Harvard freshman goalie Chuckie Hughes(27 saves) and the Crimson defense, anchored byJosh Caplan.

"I don't think their offense was on track,"Hughes said. "They really didn't have a chance toplay offense a lot. When they did, our defense wasstopping a lot of shots."

Hughes did record some crucial saves in thegame, including one in the second period withHarvard ahead, 2-0. Cornell's Doug Derraugh passedthe puck to Chris Grenier, who was cutting infront of the net.

All Grenier saw was Chuckie.

Even when Cornell rushed the length of ice forseveral three-on-two situations, Harvard'sforwards either skated back into the zone or theCrimson's defensemen hounded the Big Red playerwith the puck so he couldn't pass effectively.

Harvard's scoring barrage even had a touch ofmagic. When John Weisbrod lost his stick on theice in the third period, he quickly asked theHarvard bench for the stick. The first player tooffer was Allen Bourbeau, who had scored 12 pointsin his last three games.

Using the stick that propelled Bourbeau to thetop of the ECAC scoring chart, Weisbrod tipped ina rebound at the 11:02 mark of the final period togive Harvard a 7-1 lead.

"Al said from the bench that he wanted anassist for giving me the stick," Weisbrod said."The stick was a foot too short and had the wronglie, but it worked out."

THE NOTEBOOK: Prediction of the weekendgoes to Harvard's Mike Vukonich, who watched thegame from the Bright press box. After seeingWeisbrod take Bourbeau's stick, Vukonich predictedthat Weisbrod would score because he was usingBourbeau's stick. Thirty seconds later, Weisbrodscored...Harvard takes a break from ECAC actionnext weekend when it travels to Durham, N.H., toface the University of New Hampshire December10...The Crimson has scored at least onepower-play goal in every game this season