Crimson Beats Cornell in Latest Installment of Rivalry, Gains Ground in Conference

It’s been a long time since the Harvard men’s hockey team felt this good about its game. On Saturday night at a sold-out Bright Hockey Center, the Crimson (7-14-4, 7-7-4 ECAC) upset arch-rival No. 6 Cornell in a thrilling and brutal contest. The 4-2 victory over the Big Red (15-6-4, 10-5-3) was the second win of the weekend and could be just the boost Harvard needs to get on a winning track as it heads towards the ECAC playoffs.

This weekend marked the first time since November that the Crimson triumphed in back-to-back games.



“The positive momentum from [Friday night] to tonight is a real building block and hopefully we’ll keep it going,” said Harvard coach Ted Donato ’91. “There’s no rest for the weary.”

In the Beanpot, the Crimson suffered heartbreaking, one-goal losses to nationally-ranked rivals Boston College and Boston University. The story was different against Cornell.

The first period started as expected with the rivals exchanging aggressive checks and extra shoves after whistles. Despite five penalties in the period, neither team could capitalize on power play chances. Harvard’s sophomore goaltender Ryan Carroll faced traffic in the crease but stuffed all attempts on net. Cornell’s Ben Scrivens, one of the frontrunners for the Hobey Baker Award for the best college hockey player in the nation, looked comfortable between the pipes, positioning himself well to deflect Crimson attempts on goal.

In the second period, the pace picked up, with Harvard getting on the scoreboard first. On the power play, junior Doug Rogers found freshman Alex Killorn on the right side of the net. Killorn, who appeared to be in a passing position, sent a wrist shot on frame that squeezed between the post and Scriven’s right side. The Big Red, however, quickly tied the game back up when Colin Greening rifled in the first of his two goals on the night.

Late in the second, sophomore Matt McCollem scored the prettiest goal of the game. After speeding past a defenseman, McCollem received a perfect pass from Rogers and found himself one-on-one with the goaltender. He deked left, pulled the puck to the right, and caught Scrivens off guard with a backhand shot into the right side.

The Crimson extended its lead in the final period after freshman Daniel Moriarty fired a one-time slap shot past Scrivens.

After scoring and narrowing the gap to one, Cornell put heavy pressure on Carroll in an attempt to earn the tying goal, but the defense stayed physical and disruptive.

“You have guys doing things that are tough,” Donato said. “Blocking shots, taking hits to get pucks out. It’s what winning teams do, and I’m really proud of the way we battled today.”

Senior Nick Coskren sealed the 4-2 victory for Harvard with an empty netter with 12 seconds remaining.

“We’re excited about the win,” Donato said. “It was a good hard-fought battle. We knew it was going to be a game that was going to be very tight and a lot of momentum changes.”

The Crimson was perfect on the penalty kill and tallied all four of its goals on the power play. Scoring four goals was quite a feat for Harvard, considering Scrivens is probably the top goaltender in the nation this season. Coming into the game, the junior was first in the nation with six shutouts and a .942 save percentage. He was also second in the country with a 1.57 goals-against average.

Despite the impressive resume, Scrivens was outplayed by Carroll, who won first star honors on Saturday.

“Today [Carroll] made a couple of spectacular saves on their power play,” Donato said. “He kept us in there at times and allowed us to get that third goal, which was a big one.”

Carroll, in just the third start of his career, made 42 stops and protected the lead for a Harvard team that was outshot 44-24. Carroll has seized the role of starting goaltender with several solid performances this past week.

“I was just working hard everyday,” Carroll said. “I was just waiting for the call and it finally came. And now I’m performing.”

The victory may prove to be a turning point for the Crimson as it looks to finish the ECAC season strong and make a run through the playoffs.

Harvard just missed upsetting nationally ranked powerhouses B.C. and B.U. this month, and the win against a top-ten team in Cornell may provide the extra bit of confidence the team needs to challenge the ECAC leaders.

“Four points in any weekend is great, but especially having gone through what we have been through, I think its especially important,” Donato said. “We really have our eyes focused on getting home ice in the first round.”

Home ice will be especially important for the Crimson. This season, Harvard is 7-1-1 at home in ECAC play.

—Staff writer Jake I. Fisher can be reached at jifisher@fas.harvard.edu.