"If you would have said that (Thomas) Muldoon ('10) would have been held to one goal and (Andrew) Feinberg ('11) would have none, I would have been sure that we were going to win this," said Bryant Head Coach Mike Pressler. But the Bears disproved Pressler's logic Tuesday night and battled to a 9-7 win over their intra-state rival.
The Bears started out playing like the top 20 team that they are. For the first 19 minutes, Brown held the Bulldogs scoreless behind goalie Matt Chriss '11 while Rob Schlesinger '12, David Hawley '11 and Dan O'Brien '12 were all able to find the goal.
Brown's tenacity was obvious in the first quarter, as Jake Westerman '10 lit up one Bryant player so hard that his stick went flying.
"I'm really pleased with the effort the men came out with today, three days after a tough Princeton loss," said Head Coach Lars Tiffany '90. "We responded really well. It was a really rewarding feeling as a coach to see how we played today."
Bruno held a 4-1 lead heading into the locker room against what Pressler called his team's "hellacious defense."
The second half would not be as kind to the Bears, as Bryant whittled a 7-3 lead to a game tied at seven apiece with 5:56 left in the game.
Bryant then went on a five-to-one scoring run with players marching down the field and scoring an average of one goal a minute. In the game, the Bulldogs took 39 shots on goal compared to just 26 by Bruno.
Several of Bryant's goals came while Bruno played man down. Muldoon and Seth Ratner '11 were called at the same time for slashing and crosschecking respectively. Thirty-four seconds later, Clay Del Prince '13 was called for slashing.
The Bears came back behind the leadership of All-American Muldoon — who came into the contest averaging five goals per game. His lone goal of the night came at 4:45 to put Bruno up by one.
"Every game's a fight," Muldoon said. "We've been in that position before. You always want to score that goal, but then you understand that if you work together as an offense, then you're going to get that goal."
David Hawley '11 scored the last goal of the game, bringing his evening's total to three goals and leading Bruno to a hard-earned victory.
The men will be back in action this Saturday in an away Ivy matchup against Penn. Faceoff is set for 1 p.m.
