The men's hockey team completed a seven-game semester break with a 5-1 win over Providence College Saturday night at Meehan Auditorium, bringing the Mayor's Cup back to College Hill for the first time since the 2000-2001 season.
Overall, however, the semester break was full of mixed results for Brown, which posted four wins, two losses and a tie for the month. The Bears ran their record to 4-5-2 in the ECACHL and 9-6-3 overall.
Last Tuesday at Meehan, Brown tied 15th-ranked University of Massachusetts-Lowell, 0-0, with the two squads matching speed and strong goaltending. A week earlier, the Bears beat up on lowly American International College, 5-2, shooting freely in a somewhat sloppy effort.
Home losses to Cornell and Colgate during the second weekend of January dropped the Bears to eighth in the ECACHL conference. On the plus side, Brown captured two trophies while most students were away from campus, winning the Toyota Holiday Classic at the University of Connecticut before reclaiming the Mayor's Cup on Saturday.
Despite Brown's five goals on Saturday, the team's leaders were not particularly happy with what they saw as an inconsistent effort against the Friars from a young squad.
"I thought we played okay tonight. We did what we had to do to win," said Head Coach Roger Grillo. "Sometimes we were good, and sometimes we were so-so."
He added: "I thought (goalie) Adam (D'Alba '08) played well. And I thought Joe Bauer ('06), Seth Seidman ('08) and Rugo Santini ('06) each had a great game."
D'Alba stopped 21 of 22 shots, blanking the Friars until the game's final minute. In 11 games, the freshman goalie has a 1.61 goals against average, third-best nationally, and a .943 save percentage, best in the country. For his efforts in the UMass-Lowell and Providence College games, D'Alba was named last week's ECACHL Goalie of the Week and USCHO/ITECH National Defensive Player of the Week, receiving each award for the second time this season.
Bauer's fourth-line unit figured in four goals, including the pivotal first score.
Fifteen minutes into the first period, defenseman Sean Hurley '08 put the Bears ahead, 1-0 on a pretty play. Hurley raced up the left wing, skated past a defender and banked his own rebound after an initial save for his second goal of the year.
"It was a little bit lucky," said Hurley. "I just took it to the net and kept going for it. Joey Bauer was screening the goalie."
"Hurley's goal got us going," said Captain Les Haggett '05. It also seemed to deflate the Friars after their failed protest on the goal, which came after a quick whistle by the referee.
The Bears dominated the Friars in the second period. At 2:29, Bauer scored on an assist from Santini. A minute later, Mike Meech '05 left the Providence defense in tatters before netting his fifth goal of the season. At 11:27, Brown defenseman Pete LeCain '06 scored his first career goal to put Brown up 4-0.
In the third period, Brian McNary '08 added Brown's fifth and final goal, and D'Alba turned away two last-minute shots before Providence's Chris Chaput scored at 19:43 to deny the freshman his second straight shutout.
"The defense has been playing really well in front of me, clearing the lanes out," said D'Alba. "I saw all the shots and they had only one or two real scoring chances."
Against the nationally ranked River Hawks five days earlier, D'Alba stopped 25 shots to earn his second career shutout.
Beginning this weekend at Yale and Princeton, Brown embarks on a crucial 11-game stretch against conference opponents. The games in the coming month will determine playoff seeds and home ice advantage.
"We are still pushing to bring what makes us good onto the ice every day," said Haggett.
Haggett calls the game that his team should be playing "blue-collar hockey", a relentless, aggressive attack built on cycling the puck in the other team's zone.
On Saturday, Brown scored one goal off a cycle play, while four goals came from driving hard at the net.
"Speed, forecheck, putting the puck into good spots - that is the game we need to be playing," Grillo said. "We played great hockey at UConn. Tonight we capitalized on our chances, but we only played OK."
He added, "We've really got to sharpen up, they're like playoff games. We're trying to get into the top four."
