Grumet-Morris Survives Bumpy Weekend, Earns Two More Victories

The records continued to fall this weekend. Unfortunately, so did Dov Grumet-Morris.

Harvard’s Friday night, 2-0 blanking of St. Lawrence gave the senior netminder sole possession of the program’s single-season shutout record with six, and Grumet-Morris also tied an ECAC playoff record with his second tournament whitewash—but not before taking a few spills.

The save of Friday’s game came 14:37 into the middle frame, with the scoreboard flashing zeroes. Max Taylor controlled the puck in the low slot and slapped it on goal, but Grumet-Morris, sliding left as Taylor took the shot, reached up and behind the movement of his body to snatch the puck with his glove.

Charlie Johnson put the Crimson up with a power play goal 127 seconds later, and Harvard coach Ted Donato ’91 would later say that Grumet-Morris’ momentum-changing save was “arguably…the turning point in the game.”

“I think the save he made on Taylor in the second period was as good a save as you can see, point-blank,” Donato said. “And really, we go down and score on the power play about two or three minutes later.”

But the Saints continued to play an aggressive—and sometimes frustrated—game. With just over a minute remaining in the middle frame, Kyle Rank took a shot from the left circle that Grumet-Morris gloved easily.

As the goaltender glided behind the net to deposit the puck for a teammate, Rank rushed forward, reached out, and dragged Grumet-Morris to the ground.

The netminder had already fallen earlier in the game—the result of an innocent tangle behind the goal—and assistant captain Ryan Lannon had already taken a blatant elbow to the jaw, a penalty that had led to the Crimson’s power-play score.

And so Rank’s actions drew an angry reaction from the already wary Bright Hockey Center Crowd—and from captain Noah Welch, who was on Rank in the blink of an eye.

Rank served a charging minor on the play, while Welch was called for roughing.

Donato declined to deem the skirmish premeditated, saying “I think all teams try to make sure there’s a lot of traffic on the goalie and get pucks there and make his night a difficult one, but I don’t think there was any out-and-out intent to [hurt Grumet-Morris].”

The fans disagreed, though, sending angry screams—and one soda—towards referee Dan Murphy.

The dramatics continued 43 seconds later, when two skaters collided and slid into Grumet-Morris.

St. Lawrence’s Mark Wallmann served the charging minor this time around, while the Crimson’s Brendan Bernakevitch served the roughing penalty,

“It’s playoffs,” Grumet-Morris said diplomatically, “and that’s usual, and everyone expects that.”

“Maybe it was just part of the natural evolution of the game,” he added, “because it was a very, very physical contest throughout.”

For his part, St. Lawrence coach Joe Marsh adamantly denied that the collisions were in any way planned.

“Let me tell you right now,” Marsh said, “there’s no way we would ever run into a goaltender, not ever, especially a guy like that.”

“That’s the only thing that bothers me about the whole game,” he added, “the couple of penalties we took going hard around the net. There’s just no way that this team, that we would ever do that, that we would purposely collide with the goaltender.”

Grumet-Morris finished Friday night’s contest with 33 saves, and he would garner 32 more Saturday night—though not before facing two more close encounters.

At 12:21 in the second period, with Harvard up 1-0, Saints junior T.J. Trevelyan sent the puck towards Grumet-Morris and then followed the shot, knocking the netminder back inside the goalframe.

The Bright Center filled with angry screams as Grumet-Morris stayed on his back, for several moments. Welch materialized by the crease again, ready to defend his backstop, and Trevelyan was sent to the box for charging, negating a St. Lawrence power play.

It was the third and final charge of Grumet-Morris’ weekend, but that didn’t stop Rank—no friend of the goaltender from the night before—from slashing at Grumet-Morris’ pads with less than four minutes to play in the middle period.

Again, the Saints had been skating with the man-advantage, but again, they would lose it for beleaguering Harvard’s goaltender.

“He’s usually not that that type of player,” Marsh said of Rank. “He’s pretty disciplined player, but it was a bad penalty.”

Despite the interlopers in his crease Saturday night, Grumet-Morris set the school record for career minutes, increasing his total to 6,582. He also tied the mark for games played in a career, with 111.

It was a bumpy weekend for Grumet-Morris—but he now has four more records, two more wins, and 55 more saves to his name, and so you wouldn’t have known it unless you were there.

—Staff writer Rebecca A. Seesel can be reached at seesel@fas.harvard.edu.