Icemen to Battle Engineers, Catamounts

According to the schedule, this is the last road trip of the season for the Harvard men's hockey team. The Crimson players, however, look at it as the penultimate road trip.

One final jaunt to Detroit--for the NCAA Championships--remains.

The Crimson journeys to Troy, N.Y., to face RPI tonight, and to Burlington, Vt., to take on UVM tomorrow. All three teams are coming off weekend sweeps--RPI and Vermont downed Army and Princeton on the road and Harvard slapped Cornell and Colgate at home.

All three teams have the ECAC playoffs in mind. The Crimson (19-3 overall, 17-1 ECAC) has already secured home ice advantage for the playoffs. With one victory this weekend (or one Yale loss) Harvard would earn the regular-season ECAC title and enter the tournament as top seed for the second year in a row.

"We want to keep to our winning ways," Harvard Coach Bill Cleary said. "We want to build up good habits going into the playoffs."

Vermont, now in fifth place in the ECAC with an 11-7 record, is looking for home ice advantage. A win over Dartmouth tonight and an upset of Harvard tomorrow would help the Catamounts gain on fourth-place St. Lawrence (12-6). Eight teams make the ECAC playoffs, but only the top four get home ice.

"The remaining four games are very important to us," Vermont Coach Mike Gilligan said. "We think we need to win three out of four, or four out of four to get home ice."

RPI, on the other hand, faces the prospect of being shut out of the playoffs altogether--only two years after it won the NCAA Championship. The Engineers (8-10) are now in seventh place in the league, only one point ahead of hungry contender Princeton (6-11-1), and two points ahead of Brown (6-12) and last year's ECAC Champion, Cornell (6-12).

Harvard knocked off RPI, 5-2, and Vermont, 7-1, on the slick ice of Bright Center in early January. But the Crimson is likely to get a stiffer challenge when it faces these teams on their home turf.

Last year, the Crimson traveled to Houston Field House and bumped off the Engineers, 5-2. But the next night, All-ECAC goalie Tom Draper led the Catamounts to a stunning 3-2 upset of the Crimson at Gutterson Field House.

RPI sports a trio of freshman scorers led by Brian Ferreira, who has tallied 13 goals and 13 assists for 26 points this season. He is followed by Tony Hejna (9-17--26) and Denis Poissant (4-16--20). Against Army, Engineer Captain Neil Hernberg--who was around in the RPI glory days--recorded a hat trick and an assist to lead RPI to an 8-2 victory.

Engineer goalie Gavin Armstrong, also a freshman, owns a 3.41 goals-against average and an .886 save percentage.

On the Crimson side, goalie John Devin will be making his first start in more than two weeks tonight after twisting an ankle. In his last outing--against Army--Devin, a junior, gave up five goals while recording only 16 saves. But Devin's 15 saves helped him beat RPI in January.

Dickie McEvoy, who shut out Cornell, 3-0, last Saturday and owns a 2.34 g.a.a. will get the call against Vermont. But he is likely to be overshadowed by Catamount goalie Draper, who after starting the season on a sour note (culminating in the 7-1 loss to Harvard) has recorded a 2.67 g.a.a. and a .916 save percentage in his last 12 games.

Last weekend, Draper stopped 40 of 42 shot to lead Vermont to wins over Army and Princeton. Draper is now ranked seventh among ECAC goaltenders--and with the crowd behind him in Gutterson Field House, he is capable of turning in spectacular performances.

"Vermont plays a different game at home," Harvard Captain Peter Chiarelli said. "They like to open things up and rely on Draper."

"When you get a goaltender like Draper playing in front of that crowd, things can be tough," Cleary said.

A fast team, Vermont will try to skate with the fleet Crimson while relying on Draper to hold Harvard's big guns--Lane MacDonald (25-14--42), Tim Barakett (20-20--40) and Allen Bourbeau (14-20--34)--in check. Meanwhile, Catamount scorers like Jeff Capello (12-12--24) will try to punch a few pucks past McEvoy.

"To beat Harvard we need to stay out of the penalty box and throw a fish-net around MacDonald," Gilligan said. "We have to frustrate them in the neutral zone and get to their goalie. If Harvard has one weak spot it's in net."

The Crimson's last scheduled road trip promises to draw big and loud crowds. The RPI-Harvard match promises to be a battle between a dynasty that was and a dynasty that is.

Chiarelli has a personal stake in the RPI game. His father, Frank Chiarelli, is the Engineers' all-time leading scorer.

"I don't like RPI," Chiarelli said. "A lot of people don't like their coach [Mike Addesa]. For that reason, it's going to be a good game."

"We might face RPI in the playoffs so we have to stick it to them now," Chiarelli continued. "Any road trip is tough, but we had a good week of practice. We're up for it--it's our last road trip before Detroit, knock on wood."