MILTON, Mass. – The Manhattanville College men’s hockey team came back from a one-goal deficit on three separate occasions, eventually settling for a 3-3 (OT) tie with Curry College in a non-conference contest on Sunday evening at Max Ulin Rink.
Manhattanville (7-3-1) received goals from three different players, with sophomores Stephen Gaul (Downers Grove, Ill./Springfield Pics (USPHL)) and Charlie Ryde (Stockholm, Sweden/Flemingsbergs IK J20 (SWE)) joining freshman Matt Lippa (Richmond Hill, Ont./Oakville Blades (OJHL)) on the scoresheet for the visitors. For Lippa, it marks his fourth straight game with a goal, the longest streak by a Valiant since a four-gamer by Luc Van Natter ’14 in 2013-14 and the first time a freshman scored in four straight games since Justin Rohr ’07 did so in 2003.
Special teams played a big role in Sunday’s contest. The Colonels scored on all three of their man-up opportunities to stay ahead of the Valiants, while the Manhattanville power play scored just once on nine man-up chances.
Curry (1-7-2) opened the scoring at 6:02 of the first period, with Tyler Vankleef finding the net a mere 13 seconds into its first power play of the game. Ryde got that goal back with a power-play goal of his own, tallying his fifth of the year at 10:46, but Curry got back on top before the end of the period on Shane Harrington’s power-play goal with 2:51 left.
Manhattanville stepped up the pressure in the second period, outshooting Curry by a 16-8 margin and scoring the only goal of the frame off the stick of Gaul at the 8:41 mark.
The Valiants were whistled for too many men on the ice midway through the third period, and James Murphy made them pay with another man-up goal to put Curry up 3-2 at 11:19. But Lippa again provided some heroics for Manhattanville, tallying the eventual game-tying goal with 4:54 remaining to even the score.
The visitors outshot Curry 43-32 for the night. Freshman Tyler Feaver (Whitby, Ont./Whitby Fury (OJHL)) made 29 saves for the Valiants, while Curry’s Spencer Cookson turned aside 40 shots.
The Valiants will take the rest of the calendar year off before returning to action in 2016, when Manhattanville travels north to Norwich University’s Northfield Savings Bank Holiday Tournament. The team will begin the weekend by facing off with defending national champion Trinity (Conn.) College on January 2 at 4 p.m.
