Finally Something to Celebrate: Men's Hockey Closes Season With Dominating Win

Right out of the gate, Harvard goaltender Dov Grumet-Morris watched the referee as his 22nd birthday celebration began to go horribly, horribly wrong.

Only 3:03 into Saturday night’s regular-season-ending game against Dartmouth—and 15 seconds into the first Big Green power play—Crimson defenseman Ryan Lannon was whistled for tripping, setting the stage for nearly two full minutes of 5-on-3 hockey.

But a funny thing happened. Grumet-Morris turned Harvard’s rash of penalties on its ear, foiling not one, but two 5-on-3 disadvantages on the game and leading the Crimson (12-14-3, 10-10-2 ECAC) to a spectacular 4-0 win against the Big Green (12-8-9, 10-5-7).

That came on the heels of a 6-4 Friday loss to Vermont (9-19-4, 7-13-1), a game in which Harvard was burned for goals on three of six power plays and couldn’t stay out of the penalty box.

The weekend upturn in special teams play was a good sign for the Crimson, which ended the regular season in sixth place in the ECAC and clinched home ice in the first round of the playoffs.

The ECAC tournament begins Friday. The Catamounts, whose win against Harvard this weekend was its fifth straight, will revisit Bright Hockey Center for a best-of-three first round set.

HARVARD 4, DARTMOUTH 0

For the second-straight night Saturday, Harvard was bit by the penalty bug.

This time, the Crimson bit back.

Fighting off five-on-threes in each of the first two periods and killing eight power plays, Harvard overpowered Dartmouth 4-0 at Bright Hockey Center Saturday night with the help of a spectacular performance by goaltender Dov Grumet-Morris on his 22nd birthday.

“I thought [Dov] was exceptional,” Harvard coach Mark Mazzoleni said.

The shutout, which was Grumet-Morris’ second this season, did not come easily. The junior goaltender stopped 40 shots on goal, including 33 in the first two periods. Twenty were during the Big Green’s eight power plays.

The biggest stops of the night, however, came on the two five-on-three disadvantages. During the first, which began at 3:03 in the first period, Grumet-Morris stopped a flurry of Dartmouth shots on goal—six, to be exact—in less than two minutes.

The second came at 8:11 in the second period. With only three defenders crowded deep in the Crimson defensive zone, Grumet-Morris staved off five more shots on goal. When the penalties were killed, the sellout crowd at Bright Hockey Center rose to its feet.

“Any time you can kill that off, especially when you’re playing at home, the crowd really gets into it,” Harvard senior forward Tim Pettit said. “If you can survive something like that and capitalize, it just changes everything.”

The Crimson capitalized.

About a minute-and-a-half after each five-on-three disadvantage was killed, Harvard scored goals. Sophomore left winger Charlie Johnson scored the first at 6:26 in the first period, and freshman center Kevin Du added the second.

Johnson’s two goals were his first since coming back from a shoulder injury on Friday night. His presence on a line with junior Tom Cavanagh and Pettit was fundamental in the Harvard victory.

“Charlie’s a playmaker,” Pettit said. “[He] seemed to fit in really well today.”

In the end, Mazzoleni said, it was the goaltending that made the biggest difference from the night before.

“[Dov] was able to withstand their charge, and we were able to make our own,” he said.

VERMONT 6, HARVARD 4

Harvard clinched home ice for the first round of the ECAC playoffs Friday night, just not the way it wanted to.

Slipping into the same bad habits that plagued the team for most of the regular season, the Crimson fell 6-4 to the Catamounts in a rough-and-tumble affair that featured plenty of crushing hits, thrown punches and blown whistles.

“It wasn’t a pretty hockey game by any means,” Vermont head coach Kevin Sneddon ’92 said.

Despite being outshot 36-26, the Catamounts manned an aggressive attack on special teams—thanks to Harvard’s inability to stay out of the penalty box—that contributed to four big special teams goals. Three, including the difference-maker by right winger Chris Myers that gave Vermont a 5-3 lead at 19:10 in the second period, were on power plays.

The other, scored with the Catamounts a man down off a put-in by star forward Brady Leisenring off a rebound at 16:30 in the first, gave Vermont its first lead of the game, 2-1. It was the first shorthanded goal the Crimson had given up since a Jan. 4, 2002 win over Union.

Harvard defenseman and co-captain Kenny Smith led the Crimson with three points, all on assists, while freshmen Steve Mandes and Ryan Maki and seniors Tyler Kolarik and Tim Pettit all chipped in goals for Harvard.

Catamounts goalie Travis Russell stopped 13 of the Crimson’s final 14 shots on goal, but Harvard’s penalties made matters worse down the stretch.

“We got ourselves into trouble in the third period,” Pettit said. “It’s hard to win a game when you’re coming down from two goals if you’re not playing five-on-five hockey for the final 20 minutes.”

The game was also characterized by rough play from both sides. Among the game’s 20 penalties, four were for hits after the whistle, three were for unsportsmanlike conduct and three were for roughing. A fight broke out in the first, with Harvard’s Noah Welch and Vermont’s Jaime Sifers and Joey Gasparini being pulled from a pile next to the Harvard goal.

The game’s rough nature, Smith said, was due partly to common friendships on both sides.

“When you play a friend, you always want to pop him if you get the chance,” he said.

—Staff writer Alex McPhillips can be reached at rmcphill@fas.harvard.edu.