Saints Edged by Dartmouth

Dartmouth College built a 3-1 lead through two periods and then held off a St. Lawrence comeback to earn a 3-2 victory over the Saints in Hanover, NH on Saturday night, snapping a six-game losing streak and forcing the Saints to settle for a weekend split of its ECAC series.

The Saints cut the Dartmouth lead to 3-2 with 17:28 to go as Travis Vermeulen scored his fourth of the year and then had chances with goalie Kain Tisi pulled for an extra attacker in the final minute, gaining a two-man attack zone advantage in the final 13 seconds with a Dartmouth penalty, but could not come up with the tying goal.

The Saints are 7-5-1 overall with the weekend split and 3-3-0 in ECAC play while Dartmouth is now 1-6-0 both overall and in league play.

"We knew going in that we were going to be in for a battle and Dartmouth gave us just that," said Saint coach Joe Marsh. "They have lost some close games early in the year and are a dangerous team. They have good speed and tonight they had a very solid effort from their goaltender."

Dartmouth came out flying and grabbed a 2-0 lead in the first 7:18 of the game. The Big Green scored the game's first goal when center Scott Fleming took a pass from Adam Estoclet, slid to the center slot just outside the crease and popped the puck into the upper corner over the shoulder of Saint goalie Kain Tisi at 4:15. Dartmouth made it a 2-0 game 3:03 later when sophomore center Doug Jones snapped a power play shot inside the left post, again scoring from down low with defenseman Joe Stejskal and Evan Stephens assisting.

The Saints had some chances turned back by Big Green goalie Jody O'Neill, including a point-blank stop on Mike McKenzie late in the first, and the Saints dodged a bullet when Joe Gaudet's shot clanged off the crossbar and stayed out of the net with just 10 seconds to go in the first.

The Saints injury woes mounted in the game as they lost outstanding rookie defenseman George Hughes to an injury after the first period.

Dartmouth increased its lead to 3-0 with a power play tip-in by Joe Gaudet at the 12:39 mark of the second period, but the Saints got that back with 24.5 seconds to go in the period when Derek Keller scored his fifth of the season on a power play bomb from the center point with Jeff Caister and Nick Pitsikoulis assisting.  The Saints nearly cut it to a one-goal Dartmouth lead as Pete Child ‘s rocket from the point was gloved by O'Neill with just three seconds left in the period.

O'Neill came up with several big saves among 11 in the third period including a great glove save on Alex Curran just before Vermeulen scored. The Saints won the faceoff in the Dartmouth end after that save and Vermeulen drove the net, scoring his fourth from Curran and Brandon Bollig with 1:32 to play.

Tisi finished with 40 saves, his career high, but sustained his first loss of the season despite a solid effort in goal. O'Neill finished with 33 stops for the Big Green.