Cornell Will Have Chance To Play Catch-up

NEW HAVEN, Conn.—Impressive as it is, the Harvard men’s hockey team’s four-point lead in the ECAC is a bit deceiving.

The Crimson, along with travel partner Brown, has played 11 league games, and Yale has played 10. So, it should be no surprise that those three teams have the most points (Harvard, 18; Yale, 14; Brown, 11).

League favorite Cornell, though, is right behind with 10 points—in only six games—and has the best winning percentage with a 5-1 record in conference action.

The disparity in games played is due to differing academic calendars among the 12 schools surrounding fall semester exams. Teams like Cornell, ranked No. 7 nationally, will catch up in January when Harvard is idle during exams and reading period.

To put Harvard’s early-season success in perspective: the Crimson is on pace to have 36 by the end of the season after finishing with 23 last year.

Putting the Hug on Higgins

Later this month, Yale sophomore Chris Higgins will wear the sweater of the U.S. National Team at the World Junior Championships in Nova Scotia, Canada.

On Saturday night, however, he was still playing for the Bulldogs, and Harvard’s ability to hold him to just three shots and one assist was a big reason the Crimson came away with the victory.

Even though Yale was at home and Bulldog coach Tim Taylor had the final line change, Harvard coach Mark Mazzoleni often got the match-up against Higgins he wanted: mammoth defensemen Noah Welch and Peter Hafner against the Bulldogs’ top line of Higgins, Nick Deschenes and Vin Hellemeyer.

“I went up against the same defensive pairing a lot,” said Higgins, who has 17 points this season. “One guy was 6’4 and the other guy was 6’5. That was not very fun.”

Mazzoleni thought his forwards deserved an equal amount of credit for clamping down on Higgins, who scored a hat trick in Yale’s 4-3 win over Brown on Friday.

“We put three lines out there that we thought could really match up well against Higgins, Hellemeyer and Deschenes,” Mazzoleni said. “That was important because when you’re on the road you don’t have the luxury of matching lines. You just have to get out and play, so that allowed us to have a very balanced pressure on the ice.”

Upon Further Review

It was harmless in the end, but a controversial decision in the third period with Harvard leading 4-3 Friday could have drastically changed the game’s complexion.

After a shot from the point by Crimson junior defenseman Kenny Smith, senior Brett Nowak picked the puck out from a crowd in front and jammed it past Yale goaltender Peter Cohen for an apparent two-goal lead with 16:33 to go in the period.

But after the officials conferred—first with one another, and then with goal judge James Jamieson—they ruled the play had been whistled dead for a cross-checking call on Jeff Hristovski before the puck crossed the line.

“The ruling was that the ref had blown the whistle before the puck went in the net,” Jamieson said. “It wasn’t kicked in, but play had stopped.”

Coming Attractions

Harvard’s next two opponents—No. 4 Boston College and No. 3 Maine—played one another last weekend in Chestnut Hill with the Black Bears earning three points with a 4-3 win on Friday and Saturday night’s 2-2 tie.

The Crimson hosts BC on Wednesday before travelling to Portland, Maine, on Sunday.

The Eagles started the season 8-0-1 but are just 1-3-1 in their past five games while Harvard has won four straight.

The Crimson’s showdown with Maine, meanwhile, looms as a big “statement game” for Harvard. The Black Bears ended the Crimson’s season with an overtime victory in the NCAA tournament last March before eventually losing in overtime themselves in the championship game.

—Staff writer Jon P. Morosi can be reached at morosi@fas.harvard.edu.