Penalty Killers Shine Bright Against Bears

Brown could not have hoped for a better opportunity, and it could not have done a better job throwing it away.

With the Harvard men’s hockey team clinging to a 2-1 lead midway through the second period Friday, simultaneous penalties to junior defensemen Kenny Smith and Dave McCulloch gave Brown a 5-on-3 advantage for a full two minutes.

Harvard’s penalty killing unit would have to hold off a Brown power play ranked seventh in the nation.

Yet with the odds stacked heavily against them, Harvard’s penalty killers rose to the challenge. Helped by eight saves from sophomore goaltender Dov Grumet-Morris, the Crimson killed off Brown’s two-man advantage and repulsed the Bear’s best chance of tying the game.

“Our men did a real good job of staying in the shot lanes,” Grumet-Morris said. “That allowed me to see most of the action and hold onto the puck. In a 5-on-3, [the offense’s] job is to put it in, get rebounds and jam it home, but we did a good job in stifling that.”

That critical kill was the highlight of an exceptional night for Harvard’s penalty kill units, which shut down the dangerous Brown power play in perhaps their finest effort of the season. The Crimson held the Bears without a goal on their four chances with the man advantage, just the fourth time this season it has held the opposing power play scoreless. Harvard frustrated Brown by largely limiting its chances in front of the net, forcing the Bears to settle for long range shots.

“Our power play got some shots, but we didn’t create enough quality shots,” said Brown coach Roger Grillo. “Our shots were all coming from up top, and we weren’t creating enough traffic in front of the net. Obviously, the goaltender came up big for them there, but he was able to see the puck.”

Normally a defensive-minded team, Brown relies heavily on its power play to generate scoring. Nearly half of Brown’s goals have come with the man advantage, the highest such percentage in the ECAC. The Bears have been most successful this season when taking a lead early on a powerplay goal, then counter-attacking as the opponent tries to pull even.

Thanks to its penalty killers, however, Harvard was able to stay in front of Brown, eliminating a critical component of the Bear’s winning formula.

Harvard’s penalty killing units were so effective that on Brown’s early power play chances it was hard to tell that Harvard was skating a man down. The Crimson put as much pressure on the Brown goal as the Bears did on Grumet-Morris, displaying an aggressiveness on the penalty kill reminiscent of two season ago, when Harvard led the ECAC with 10 shorthanded goals.

That attacking mentality nearly paid off in the first period. Captain Dominic Moore’s tap-in following a scramble in front of the Brown net was waved off when referee Dan Murphy ruled the whistle had already blown, much to the chagrin of Mazzoleni.

“That puck was in, and then he blew the whistle,” said Harvard coach Mark Mazzoleni.

—Staff writer Eli M. Alper can be reached at alper@fas.harvard.edu.