The Hobart College hockey team jumped out to a 4-0 lead midway through the second period and held off the Valiants for a 4-3 victory in an ECAC West game tonight at Terry Conners Rink in Stamford, Conn. With their seventh straight win, the Statesmen improve to 9-4-4 overall and 3-1-3 in the ECAC West.
Four different Statesmen scored. Sophomore goalie Lino Chimienti (Montreal, Quebec) played all 60 minutes and finished with 22 saves in goal for Hobart.
Manhattanville falls to 10-7-0 and 3-4-0 in ECAC West play. Jake Mooney scored twice for the Valiants and Louie Balzano chipped in three assists. Luc Van Natter produced two assists. Brian Fleming played the opening 29:58 in goal and made eight saves. Alex Scola came in for 28:59 and finished with 10 saves.
Sophomore Mac Olson (Grosse Pointe, Mich.) started the scoring 8:14 into the game. He leads Hobart with nine goals this year. At 13:16 classmate Bo Webster (Aurora, Ontario) gave the Statesmen a 2-0 edge on a power-play goal off assists from junior Brad McBride (Lone Tree, Colo.) and sophomore Ben Gamache (Longlac, Ontario). It was Webster’s fifth goal of the season.
The Statesmen continued to roll in the second period. At 5:36, senior Tommy Fiorentino (New Hartford, N.Y.) notched his fifth goal of the year to make it 3-0. A little over four minutes later, junior Robert Sovik (Prague, Czech Republic) added a shorthanded tally after a pass from juniorTerrence O’Neill (Kearny, N.J.). With 3:29 left in the middle period, Teegan Waugh put The Valiants on the board.
Mooney produced back-to-back goals just under five minutes apart in the third to get Manhattanville within one. With 1:03 left in the game, the Valiants pulled their goalie for an extra skater, and with just shy of a minute left in regulation one of the Statesmen was called for a two-minute cross-checking penalty, but Hobart held off Manhattanville for the remainder.
The Statesmen killed off all five of the Valiants’ power-play attempts. Hobart went 1-for-8 on the power play. Manhattanville finished with a 25-22 edge in shots.
The Statesmen and the Valiants will meet again tomorrow, Jan. 25, for another ECAC Wests game at 7:30 p.m.
