FROZEN APPLE 2024 @ Madison Square Garden, New York, New York
CORNELL 3, QUINNIPIAC 3 [OT-SOW] … Box Score | Game Recap | Video Highlights
What an exciting night our players had on the ice with over 16,000 fans in attendance, and a sea of red in the stands. We don’t want this to be the highlight of a career, but it certainly will be memorable for the team.
It was a roller coaster kind of game. We played very strong in the first and third periods but sandwiched a poor second. Getting senior forward Sullivan Mack back from an injury after missing four games was huge on Saturday night but losing senior captain Kyle Penny for the weekend hurt.
We scored just after over two minutes into the game. Sophomore forward Jonathan Castagna started a controlled breakout, taking the puck from around our net and moving down ice where he fired a shot from the bottom of the faceoff circle, picked up the puck behind the Quinnipiac goal, and set up Mack for a one-timer from the right faceoff circle. Near the end of the opening period (18:46), we scored a shorthanded goal to increase our lead, 2-0. The Quinnipiac power play had fired a couple of shots on our goal when sophomore forward Ryan Walsh chipped the puck between two defenders to set up a 2-on-0 breakaway with junior forward Dalton Bancroft. He one-timed the puck off a Walsh pass into the net. At this point, we were playing excellent, smart hockey.
The second period was completely different. Part of the second period was a strong push by Quinnipiac, and part was our play. I don’t say this very often, but part of it was the officiating. All the above contributed to our second period performance. It all started just 11 seconds into the period, when the Bobcats scored on a power play to make it 2-1. Then, at 4:55, it was a new hockey game at 2-2. We had only three shots in the first two minutes of the second period, but no shots in the next 10 minutes. Quinnipiac made it 3-2 at the 14-minute mark of the second period with a shorthanded goal.
We rebounded at 1:12 into the third period when senior forward Jack O’Leary tied the game, 3-3, clearing a rebound into the net off a Mack shot. We out shot Quinnipiac 13-6 in the last 20 minutes of regulation. I was pleased during the third period on how we pushed back, got the equalizer, and kept coming for most of the period.
Neither team scored during the five-minute, 3-on-3 overtime. We had an extraordinary effort by three players who stayed on the ice for almost three minutes of overtime. Sophomore defenseman Hoyt Stanley, and seniors Hank Kempf and Jack O’Leary gutted it out and did what they had to do until a whistle finally allowed a line change. That was an outstanding effort by those guys.
In the shootout, Dalton Bancroft scored for us, followed by a Quinnipiac miss and then two saves by senior goaltender Ian Shane.
Shane made 26 saves, and the Bobcats goaltender stopped 30 shots. We were 0-for-2 on the power play, and they were 1-for-5.
We return to Lynah Rink on Friday night to face Colgate before making the trip to Hamilton to face our travel partner on Saturday evening. As always, we appreciate your support at home and on the road.