MIDDLEBURY, Vt. – The Manhattanville College men’s hockey team entered the final frame with a one-goal lead, but a pair of third-period tallies lifted Saint Anselm College to a 2-1 victory over the Valiants in the championship game of the 2016 Middlebury College Holiday Classic, played on Saturday evening at Kenyon Arena.
Manhattanville (7-6-0) led 1-0 after a second-period goal from sophomore Bryan Platt (Trumbull, Conn./Springfield Pics (USPHL)) and had kept Saint Anselm (6-5-1) to just nine shots over the first 40 minutes, but goals from Vin D’Amato and Michael Ferraro put the Division II Hawks past the Valiants in the first-ever meeting between the two teams.
Manhattanville did well to limit the offensive chances of Saint Anselm in the opening period, holding the Hawks to only three shots on goal – including at least 15 straight shotless minutes in the middle of the frame. The Valiants had nine chances at the other end, but Colin Soucy stopped all nine attempts to keep the game scoreless headed into the first intermission.
The Valiants started the second period by killing off a five-on-three disadvantage, but then carried that momentum to the other end of the ice, where senior assistant captain Adam Platt (Trumbull, Conn./Springfield Pics (USPHL)) fed his brother Bryan for a breakaway that was converted at the 5:03 mark.
Junior Kyle Redmond (Toronto, Ont./Northfield Mount Hermon) made several big saves to keep the Hawks off the board in the period, including a key glove save on a shorthanded breakaway chance from CJ Blaszka with less than three minutes left, helping Manhattanville take a one-goal lead into the third period.
D’Amato tied the game 4:07 into the third stanza on his team’s second shot on goal of the period, and Ferraro added the go-ahead score by tipping home a shot from the blue line at the 10:06 mark of the period.
The Valiants managed only four shots on target over the final 10 minutes, as the team was unable to generate any good opportunities in the waning minutes when Redmond found his way to the bench.
Manhattanville ended the game with a 27-15 edge in total shots, as Soucy made 26 shots to pick up the win. Redmond suffered his first loss of the year, making 13 saves on 15 attempts.
Following the game, senior co-captain Teagan Waugh (Nanaimo, B.C./Powell River Kings (BCHL)) and junior defenseman Thimmy Garbenius (Nykvarn, Sweden/Sodertalje SK (SWE)) were named to the All-Tournament Team.
The Valiants will take to the ice for the first time in 2017 on Thursday, when the squad travels to Connecticut College for a non-conference matchup beginning at 7 p.m.
