Dov Downs Brown, Sets Shutout Record

Home, sweet home.

That’s what the Harvard men’s hockey players were thinking as they dominated travel partner Brown 3-0 in their final home game of the regular season at the Bright Hockey Center last night.

With its victory against the Bears (14-10-3, 9-9-2 ECAC), the No. 11 Crimson (18-7-2, 15-4-1 ECAC) improved its record at Bright to 12-1-0 for the season and extended its ECAC winning streak to nine games—vaulting it to second place in the standings.

It also gained the momentum it may need with a crucial road trip coming up this weekend against league foes Dartmouth and Vermont.

“We got a big game coming up this weekend,” said Harvard head coach Ted Donato ’91. “We were looking at a chance to play for the Ivy title on Friday night, and we needed to win this game to make that happen.”

The night was a historical one for the Crimson. With his third clean sheet in Harvard’s past four league games, senior goaltender Dov Grumet-Morris tied the single-season mark of five shutouts while setting another record with the 10th blanking of his career.

“He’s huge right now,” captain Noah Welch said. “He’s our best player, and he’s playing well.”

Grumet-Morris delivered his biggest save of the night with less than a minute remaining in the second period.

Brown forward Sean Dersch sent a pass from the left point to the goal line, where cycling linemate Brian McNary took the puck and tried to wrap it around Grumet-Morris. But the Crimson goaltender made an initial sliding pad save and then stopped McNary’s rebound attempt as well—preserving Harvard’s 2-0 lead.

The missed opportunity for the Bears appeared to reenergize the Crimson.

On the ensuing attack, assistant captain Ryan Lannon received a blue-line pass from senior forward Brendan Bernakevitch and took a shot from the point.

Sophomore forward Ryan Maki’s deflection flew past Bears goaltender Adam D’Alba with only 17 seconds remaining in the period.

Given a 3-0 cushion, Grumet-Morris and the Harvard defense would take care of the rest.

“[That sequence was] probably the turning point in the game,” Donato said. “[Grumet-Morris] makes that great save, and we come down and score a goal—that’s a backbreaker for the team that’s chasing from behind.”

Grumet-Morris got plenty of help from his penalty kill unit. Despite the absence of regular special-teamer Kevin Du, who was out with the flu, the Crimson allowed only five shots in five Brown power-play opportunities.

“Brown’s got a good power play,” Donato said. “It was dangerous coming in. We knew from [the] special teams end of it that we needed to a good job. I think our guys really battled hard.”

On a night where the defense was solid, the Harvard offense didn’t look too shabby either.

The Crimson opened the scoring in the first period when Bernakevitch carried the puck into the offensive zone and sent the puck to the left circle. Sophomore forward Ryan Maki corralled the bobbling puck and whipped it back across the ice to the slot and onto assistant captain Tom Cavanagh’s tape. With Bears goaltender Adam D’Alba out of position, Cavanagh stuffed the puck into the gaping net for Harvard’s first score at 4:09.

Despite multiple opportunities, the Crimson would not strike again until 13:33 of the second period. Junior forward Charlie Johnson skated in and one-timed the perfect pass into the net to increase Harvard’s lead to 2-0.

With that tally, the Crimson was well on its way to securing its 18th win of the season—making Donato the all-time winningest rookie coach in Harvard history.

—Staff writer Karan Lodha can be reached at klodha@fas.harvard.edu.