Cornell Beaten By BU at MSG

Photo by DSPics.com

Boxscore

NEW YORK, N.Y. -- A span of 3:16 in the first period turned out to be the difference for the Cornell men's hockey team, making its return to New York City with a 6-3 defeat at the hands of Boston University on Saturday night at Madison Square Garden. The Big Red fell behind 3-0 after a three-goal flurry in the first period that would ultimately be the undoing for the Big Red.

The Big Red (4-4-0) would cut into the lead in the second period on Riley Nash's third goal of the season, but Boston University (4-7-2) answered six minutes later to keep Cornell down by three after two periods. And in the third, an early goal just 1:17 into the period put Cornell down 5-1 before a two-goal rally cut the deficit to two. Boston University tacked on an empty net goal with 23 seconds to play, providing the final margin.

COrnell went 2-for-7 on the power play on the night, but again, it was the three-goal outburst from Joe Periera, Luke Popko and Brandon Yip that was the difference in the contest. Cornell goalie Ben Scrivens tied his career high with 36 saves in the contest, including a Cornell-best 15 saves in the second period as he did his part to keep the Big Red within striking distance.

Boston University goalie Brett Bennett picked up 25 stops in picking up the win for the Terriers, who went 1-for-3 on the power play on the night.

Cornell got the game's first power play with 4:10 gone in the first period when Boston University's Brian Straight was called for tripping. Cornell failed to capitalize on the power play, but with five seconds remaining in the man advantage, a tripping penalty on Chris Higgins extended the power play for another two minutes. Still, Boston University goalie Bennett turned away all three shots the Big Red fired on the net with the man advantage, then turned the tables on Cornell when Joe Pereria scored his first goal of the season with an assist to Nick Bonino. Just 18 seconds later, another shot from the Terriers, this time by Luke Popko, found its way past Scrivens and into the back of the net, putting Cornell down 2-0 with 9:08 gone in the first period.

With 8:54 to go, a turnover in the neutral zone led to the Terriers' Brandon Yip skating in alone on Scrivens, firing a shot past the glove side and into the top half of the goal, putting the BIg Red down by three midway through the first period and silencing the mostly pro-Cornell crowd.

With just over eight minutes to go in the second period, the Big Red got on the board with a power-play tally. Colin Greening worked the puck to Blake Gallagher at the point, who ripped a wrister to the net that was deflected by Riley Nash inside the near post of the goal, putting Cornell down just 3-1. That goal appeared to be all that the Big Red needed as Cornell came out with more intensity than had been shown through the first half of the contest - and perhaps more importantly, brought the crowd back into the contest.

That momentum was short-lived, however, as a tripping call on Brendon Nash gave the Terriers their third power-play of the game. This time, the Terriers got a fortunate break as Pete MacArthur scored his seventh goal of the season with nine seconds remaining on the penalty to Nash.

With 1:17 gone in the third period, the Terriers added to the margin as Colin Wilson took a pass from Yip in the neutral zone and fired a shot that trickled across the goal line, giving Boston University a 5-1 lead.

Two and a half minutes later, the Big Red again cut into the deficit, as Brendon Nash ripped a shot from the top of the circle that went wide of the cage, but had BU goalie Bennett sprawling to try to save it. The puck caromed around the boards to Jared Seminoff at the left point, who ripped a shot that deflected off a BU player's skate and slid into the goal, cutting the score to 5-2.

Cornell got a great chance to make a game of it in the final five minutes. A tripping call on BU's Brian McGuirk with 4:21 to play gave the Big Red its sixth power play, then, just 55 seconds later, another tripping penalty on Eric Gryba gave Cornell a 5-on-3 for 1:05. Nine seconds later, the Big Red capitalized, as, after a timeout by the Big Red bench, Topher Scott jammed home a puck after a pileup in front of the net to cut the margin to 5-3. Seconds later with the Big Red still on the power play, Riley Nash had a golden chance that was turned away with a brilliant save by Bennett.

Scrivens went to the bench for the extra attacker with 1:31 to play, and though the Big Red had several rushes down the ice, they could not get closer for the next minute. After an icing call on the Terriers, Blake Gallagher won a faceoff to Riley Nash, who fed a pass across the ice to his brother, Brendon. Brendon's shot was blocked, and BU's MacArthur fed a pass to Bryan Ewing, who slotted the puck into the open net with 23.7 seconds remaining to send the Big Red to its final margin of 6-3.

The game marked Cornell's first contest at Madison Square Garden since Jan. 4, 1976. Cornell now falls to 10-5 all-time in games played at Madison Square Garden, including a 5-2 mark now in games played at the current building.

The Big Red closes out the fall semester at home on Friday, Nov. 30, taking on Massachusetts in a 7:30 p.m. contest at Lynah Rink. The later start is to accomodate the Cornell women's hockey team's game against Quinnipiac that same afternoon.

GAME NOTES
* Legendary former coaches Ned Harkness (Cornell) and Jack Kelly (BU) dropped the ceremonial puck prior to the contest. Harkness was escorted onto the ice by former Big Red captain John Hughes.

* Scrivens' 13 saves are the most he has ever been called onto make in the first period and the second-most he has made in any period. Scrivens made 14 stops in the third period last season at Harvard.

* The three-goal deficit at the first intermission is the largest Cornell has had since Rensselaer also popped out to a 3-0 lead on Dec. 1, 2006 at Lynah Rink.

* Director of Athletics Andy Noel welcomed members of the Big Red's two national championship teams

* Cornell's first intermission also featured an impressive video montage of all of the great moments and players in Big Red hockey history as put together by Tracy Vosburgh and Chris Pelkie to entertain the estimated 11,000 Cornell fans among the sold-out crowd of 18,200.

* After being outshot 8-0 to open the game, the Big Red was outshot 7-0 to open the second period.

* Scrivens set a career-best with his 15 second period saves.

* The BU win snapped a three-game Cornell streak in the series between the two programs.