The Northeastern men’s hockey team (12-14-1, 7-10 HE) fell 4-1 to the Harvard University Crimson (13-10-1, 10-6 Eastern College Athletic Conference) in the Beanpot tournament consolation game. This was the second consecutive year the Huskies were defeated by the Crimson in the consolation game.
“We were hoping to come in here and hopefully build on a game like this at the Garden, and I don’t see it being an effort thing,” said head coach Jerry Keefe. “It’s an execution and a swagger thing for this group right now — it’s that simple. We’ve got to find our way to get ourselves out of it.”
Like in its game against the University of Connecticut Feb. 6, Northeastern was outhustled in this game.
Junior forward Dylan Hryckowian — the Huskies’ top scorer — was out of the lineup due to an injury, putting the Huskies at a disadvantage. Northeastern was on the power play five times, but each time, the team could not find the back of the net.
In the press conference, Keefe said Hryckowian will be back this season and it’s a “week to week thing right now.”
Four minutes into the opening period, Harvard’s senior captain and forward Joe Miller was sent to the sin bin for interference. The Crimson killed the penalty, allowing Northeastern only two shots in the two minute advantage.
Four minutes later, junior forward Eli Sebastian was sent to the penalty box for slashing. Northeastern killed the penalty, also limiting the Crimson to two shots.
Harvard netted the first goal of the night 12 minutes into the opening period, courtesy of junior defenseman Matthew Morden.
Senior forward Marek Hejduk collected the puck in the neutral zone before passing it across the ice to senior forward Philip Tresca. There were a couple of close interceptions for the Huskies, but Tresca managed to take a one-timer pass off the bobble to Morden at the back door.
Eighteen minutes into the period, freshman forward Richard Gallant went to the penalty box for slashing, putting Northeastern on its second power play of the night. The advantage lingered into the second period, but the break between periods did not help the Huskies even the score.
The second period was littered with penalties — each team incurred two. Harvard tacked on three more throughout the game, while Northeastern only had one more from the first period.
Two minutes into the second period, sophomore forward Joe Connor was sent to the box for interference. About 30 seconds later, the Crimson capitalized on the opportunity, scoring another goal. However, Northeastern challenged the call for goaltender inference and, after review, the goal was overturned.
With 36 seconds left in Connor’s time in the penalty box, Sebastian was sent to the box again, this time for cross-checking. Harvard’s sophomore defenseman Lucas St. Louis was also sent to the sin bin for embellishment.
Four minutes into the period, sophomore forward William McDonough’s roughing put Northeastern on another unsuccessful power play.
With six minutes left in the period, Connor fired a shot into the back of the net, leveling the scoreboard.
On a miscommunication after a Harvard faceoff win, freshman forward Giacomo Martino grabbed the puck and skated behind the Crimson’s net to find Connor in the left faceoff circle. Connor sniped the one-timer into the net.
Harvard took its lead back three minutes later, courtesy of freshman forward Chase Stefanek.
The period ended with the Crimson leading the Huskies in shots on goal 30 to 23.
Harvard added to its lead with six minutes left in the final period when sophomore defenseman Sean Keohane took a shot from inside the blue line and the puck deflected off of Gallant and into the net.
With 11 minutes remaining, freshman forward Jack Pechar hit the back of the net for Northeastern, but an offsides call erased the goal.
Junior goaltender Lawton Zacher was pulled from the net for an extra skater for Northeastern with three minutes to go. The extra man failed to lift Northeastern out of its three-point deficit, as the Crimson scored again with less than two minutes left in the game. After an initial save by senior defenseman Austen May, Tresca scored on the empty net.
The horn blew, putting Northeastern at the bottom of the Beanpot pyramid for the second year in a row.
The team is currently facing a four-game losing streak in the Hockey East, plus the shootout loss against Boston University in the Beanpot semifinal.
“There’s definitely urgency in [this game] for sure. I don’t remember there ever not being urgency,” Keefe said. “We’ve won [the consolation] game a few times, and I thought it helped us down the stretch. This game was extremely important to us tonight.”
Northeastern will face the Providence College Friars (18-7-2, 13-3-1 HE) Feb. 13 and 14 at 7 p.m. and 5:30 p.m., respectively, in Rhode Island.
