The men's hockey team had little to be happy about on Tuesday night. From the get-go, Providence College dominated the Mayor's Cup game between the teams and cruised to an 8-0 win.
"We just didn't show up to play. They out-worked us, and we didn't show up with the proper attitude," said Head Coach Roger Grillo. "From the start of the game, we weren't competing hard enough to win. They saw that we were off our game, and they cranked it up."
Penalties hurt the Bears early, and the Friars found themselves with a power play opportunity just over a minute into the game. It took PC only 13 seconds of the power play to capitalize on the man advantage, when Pierce Norton got to a rebound near the left post and flicked the puck past goaltender Dan Rosen '10 to give the Friars the early lead.
Brown contained PC's attack for the remainder of the period, despite being outshot 15-4, but the Bears missed their best scoring opportunity when assistant captain David Robertson '08 hit the post on a power play shot. Bruno headed to the locker room trailing 1-0.
In the second period, the Friars scored five times, in a frame in which they outshot the Bears by the dominating margin of 20-3. Brown even started off the period with a man advantage, but PC went up 2-0 on a breakaway goal just 29 seconds into the frame.
The Friars added three more goals over the next 12:05, at which point goaltender Tristan Favro '10 made his collegiate debut in relief of Rosen. Favro made saves on the first two shots he faced, but with 47 seconds left in the period, the Friars took advantage of a four-on-three to add another goal, increasing the lead to 6-0.
Grillo attributed many of the team's problems on Tuesday to a loss of focus after falling behind early in the game.
"You start to get off track, and you start to get individualistic, and you compound the problem," he said. "We haven't been playing great of late, and last night it caught up with us."
The Bears' woes continued in the third period due in part to five PC power plays, one of which resulted in a goal to put the Friars ahead 7-0. Brown failed to capitalize on three man-advantages of its own in the final period, despite having six shots on goal during the power plays.
PC capped off the scoring with a shot from the right faceoff circle with 17 seconds left to make the final score 8-0.
Favro finished with 20 saves on 23 shots in his first collegiate game. Still, the effort came in what was by far the Bears' worst loss of the season.
"That was an embarrassing effort for all of us," Grillo said. "Everyone in this program, the players and the coaches, know that we have to do better."
Brown will try to rebound from the humiliating loss when it travels to New Haven, Conn. to face Yale on Saturday, in its first league game since a 4-2 defeat at the hands of Clarkson University on Nov. 17.
