The last time the Quinnipiac men’s ice hockey played to a tie was a 2-2 draw at Eastern College Athletic Conference foe Rensselaer on Feb. 26. That’s what played out Saturday against ECAC foe Harvard Crimson at Bright Hockey Center in Cambridge, Mass.
The Bobcats tied the Crimson, 2-2, in a game in which all the goals were scored in the first two periods. With the tie, Quinnipiac moves to (7-3-1, 1-1-1 ECAC) while Harvard moves to (0-1-1) overall and in league play.
Quinnipiac head coach Rand Pecknold was disappointed with the way the Bobcats have played in their last two road games, including a 5-4 loss at Dartmouth Friday. The Bobcats had leads in both games but could not hold the lead.
“I’m disappointed with how we played tonight,” Pecknold said. “I thought about half our guys competed hard and half our guys took a lot of shortcuts. We’ve been good early this season because we’ve had 18 guys competing, but we just had too many guys taking shortcuts tonight.”
The Bobcat offense was led by October’s ECAC Player of the Month, Jeremy Langlois, who scored his ninth goal of the season with two minutes remaining in the first period. Mike Dalhuisen stole the puck from a Harvard forward in the defensive zone and skated down the right wing across the ice. Dalhuisen chipped the puck under the point and fed a back-hander to Matthew Peca on the right wing. Peca found senior captain Scott Zurevinski, who slid the puck to a wide open Langlois on the right wing for a one-timer blast into the back of the net for the game’s first goal.
Peca’s eighth assist of the year earns him a team-leading 10-game consecutive point streak, which is a Quinnipiac rookie record, while Langlois is tied in second in the country in goals.
The Crimson offense tied the game just over a minute into the second period. Harvard’s Conor Morrison scored on the power play 1:19 in the second period. Harvard’s Alex Fallstrom passed to Alex Killorn who wristed a shot on Bobcats goaltender Eric Hartzell. Hartzell denied the initial shot but Morrison blasted in a bouncing puck for the rebound to knot the score at 2.
Just seconds later, after the faceoff the Crimson appeared to have scored the go-ahead goal but officials reviewed the goal and waived it off. Harvard’s Colin Blackwell should have given the Crimson the go-ahead goal but he wiffed on a one-timer and slid into the cage while the puck went in, but the net came dislodged and the goal was whistled off.
The Bobcats battled back when Cory Hibbeler scored the go-ahead goal at the 12:32 mark to give Quinnipiac a one-goal lead. Ben Arnt pushed the puck outside the boards behind the Crimson goal and fed a pass to Loren Barron. Barron wristed a shot on goal where Hibbeler was standing on the short side post and tipped in a shot past Crimson goaltender Raphael Girard.
Harvard would not go down without a fight. The Crimson tied the game at 2 with just over seven minutes remaining in the second period when a scrum ensued in the Bobcats crease. Hartzell stopped two shots before he was on his back in the crease and could not see the puck through the battle in front. David Valek scored after he picked up the loose puck in front of the crease and deposited it in to tie the game at two.
The third period could not produce any goals as five penalties were called. Neither team could capitalize on the man-advantage opportunities. The five-minute overtime also ended in a scoreless period.
The Bobcats and Crimson were fairly balanced on offense. The Bobcats had one more shot than the Crimson. Hartzell stopped 23 of 25 shots, while his counterpart Girard denied 24 of 26 shots. The Bobcats were whistled for five penalties and the Crimson were called for four.
“Hartzy was solid,” Pecknold said. “It was tough at first, he didn’t get a lot of shots, but he got some work later. He did his job, he held them to two goals, and we’ve got to score more than that to win.”
Quinnipiac will return to the ice on Friday at 7 p.m. when the Bobcats host ECAC opponent Clarkson at High Point Solutions Arena at the TD Bank Sports Center.
