The men's hockey team went into overtime in both of its games this weekend, tying Colgate on Friday night and losing to No. 10 Cornell on Saturday.
Down 2-0, the Bears (3-21-5, 3-15-4 ECAC Hockey) came back on Friday night thanks to strong play from several freshmen. After letting in two first-period goals, Mike Clemente '12 shut down the goal for all of the second period and most of the third. When he let one slip by him with less than five minutes left, the freshmen line of Jarred Smith '12, Bobby Farnham '12 and Jack Maclellan '12 produced a goal to even the score, 3-3.
Saturday night was senior night, both in ceremony and in play. Ryan Garbutt '09 had a pair of goals to put the Bears ahead 2-0 early in the third period, but Cornell took advantage of three power-play opportunities late in the game - scoring one of its three goals just after a man advantage expired and two more on the power-play.
Brown 3, Colgate 3 (OT)
The Raiders (11-16-7, 6-11-5), who rank third from the bottom of the ECAC, came to the Meehan unbeaten in their last three games, while the Bears, who are last in the ECAC, came into the weekend following a win over Quinnipiac the previous Saturday, 3-2.
In the Quinnipiac game, assistant captain Matt Vokes '09 had been given a five-minute major penalty and a game disqualification, ordered to take effect in Friday night's match-up with Colgate, when an altercation broke out after the Bears' game with Quinnipiac last Saturday.
"It just wasn't fair," said Head Coach Roger Grillo. "It was totally unjustified because he didn't do anything."
But Grillo found out that his team's leading scorer would, in fact, take the ice on Friday night, when the ECAC sent him a letter apologizing for the mistake and revoking Vokes' game disqualification.
Colgate came out strong in the opening frame, scoring two goals in the first nine minutes, the first of which came seven and a half minutes into the game, when Tom Riley made a shot in traffic from point-blank range.
"It was kind of a scrum in front and he chipped it over my shoulder," Clemente said. "I didn't really see the puck."
Colgate's Austin Smith tacked on another one just 1:10 later to put the Raiders up, 2-0.
"We were down 2-0 eight minutes into the game and we didn't give up," Clemente said. "That takes a lot of character."
Less than a minute into the second period, Sean Muncy '09 left the puck for Vokes at center ice. Vokes split two defenders and came up on goalie Charles Long from the left. He deked the goalie and shot the puck near-side to bring the Bears within one goal.
Fifteen minutes later, Brown got the equalizer when Eric Slais '09 sent a cross-ice feed to Farnham. Farnham shot the one-timer into Long's blockers, but Slais got the rebound from the other side and fired the puck into the net before Long had a chance to get back into position.
The game looked like it was headed for overtime with the score knotted, 2-2, with less than five minutes remaining in the third period, but Jason Fredricks put Colgate ahead with 4:38 left in regulation when he sent a rocket from the left faceoff circle over Clemente's right shoulder. Defenseman Jeremy Russell '10 laid out on the ice to try to block the shot, but it went over him on its way to the back of the net.
Less than a minute later, Brown evened the score again. Maclellan passed from the right faceoff circle to Farnham at the goal line. Farnham immediately redirected the puck to Smith, who was stationed in front of the goal, and Smith put the one-timer past Long to make it a 3-3 game.
The game headed into overtime, and it almost ended when Brian Day of Colgate got on a one-on-one with Clemente, but the goalie turned away Day's backhand and the score remained even.
Clemente finished the game with 38 saves, while Long had 25 in the 3-3 tie.
"I thought (Clemente) played great," Grillo said. "We made some big mistakes and he erased the mistake. That's what his job is."
No. 10 Cornell 3, Brown 2 (OT)
In front of a crowd of 1,517 with more red in it than brown, the Bears got off to a comfortable lead thanks to two goals from Garbutt.
In the Bears' last home game of the season, they took on Cornell (18-7-4, 13-6-3), who had crushed them 5-1 in Ithaca on Jan. 24. Cornell came into the game after losing to ECAC leader Yale (20-7-2, 15-5-2), ranked No. 12 nationally, by a score of 4-2 the night before.
The two teams looked even in the first period, with both teams recording eight shots on goal, and neither team scoring.
Both goalies were perfect through the first 34:38 of game play. Clemente was much more conservative in the net, while Big Red goalie Ben Scrivens was aggressive in coming out of the net to make passes and control the puck.
With less than six minutes remaining in the middle frame, Vokes sent the puck in on the left boards. Scrivens came out from the net to try to stop the rim-around, but he missed the puck. It deflected off the boards out to Garbutt on the right side, and Garbutt scored the tough-angle goal with Scrivens out of position to give Brown a 1-0 lead.
Garbutt scored another goal just 3:43 into the final frame. Mike Wolff '12 fired a shot from the right side of the blue line, which Scrivens deflected, but the rebound went right to Garbutt, who put the puck into the back of the net.
Cornell began its comeback with less than 12 minutes remaining when Patrick Kennedy scored the Big Red's first goal just after a Cornell power-play expired.
Colin Greening then made it a 2-2 game with under six minutes remaining off a rebound from Cornell captain Michael Kennedy's shot.
Just over two minutes into overtime, Michael Kennedy sent a pass out to Blake Gallagher, who was stationed a few feet in from the blue line - directly in front of Clemente. Gallagher wound back and put the puck through Clemente's five-hole.
"The guy was able to shoot it before I could get a good look at where it was coming from," Clemente said.
The Cornell bench stormed onto the ice as Gallagher jumped up and down. Clemente rested on his knees, staring down at the ice.
His teammates came up to him and offered him encouragement. They told him, "'Don't worry about it. We all played hard,'"
Clemente said.
"I said to Roger (Grillo) afterwards that I know it's been a tough year for him, but I have a tremendous amount of respect for him and his kids," said Cornell Head Coach Mike Schafer.
After the game, the Bears stayed on the ice to watch Brown's seven seniors - Garbutt, Muncy, Vokes, Slais, Matt Palmer '09, Mike Stuart '09 and Mark Sibbald '09 - take pictures in their last time on the ice at Meehan. All of the players got to play in Saturday's game, except Sibbald - the third-string goalie.
"I felt bad for Mark Sibbald because he's a class act," Grillo said. "He's one of the nicest, classiest kids we've had in the program since I've been here."
The Bears will take the ice in Cambridge, Mass. next Friday in their first game of a best-of-three series against fifth-seed Harvard (9-14-6, 9-7-6) for the opening round of the ECAC Hockey Playoffs. Brown and Harvard tied in both of their two meetings earlier this season.
Clemente said that despite the Cornell loss, the Bears can take positive energy from the game.
"We had them on the ropes," Clemente said. "As Coach Grillo said, 'That's playoff hockey.'"
