Icemen Crusade Against Saints, Golden Knights

There's no place like home--at least for the Harvard men's hockey team, which hasn't played a game at the Bright Hockey Center since November 26.

After six consecutive road games which took the Crimson to such exotic places as Duluth, Minn., Troy, N.Y. and New Haven, Conn., Harvard (8-3-1 overall, 6-2-1 ECAC) finally returns home for two games this weekend against St. Lawrence (6-6-0, 4-2-0) tonight at 7:30 and Clarkson (6-4-2, 3-2-1) tomorrow at 7.

"Anytime you come home there is an extra comfort, and extra day of practice and the fans," sophomore Kirk Nielsen said.

Not that these two games will be a piece of cake.

The Saints and Golden Knights were two of only three teams (Princeton was the third) to deny Harvard a win at home last year--Clarkson and Harvard tied, 4-4, and St. Lawrence handed the Crimson its only home ice defeat, 3-1.

However, the Crimson is coming into the weekend with momentum and motivation. Winners of two straight non-league games, including Monday night's 7-6 victory over defending NCAA champion Maine (see box score), Harvard is only two points ahead of Brown and three points in front of Colgate in the ECAC standings.

Two victories for Harvard would mean a lot for a team that is struggling for consistency, sporting a mediocre 2-2-1 record in its last five ECAC games, although the last one was a 12-1 shellacking of Yale.

The Crimson is still taking far too many penalties, many of them retaliation and plainly dumb fouls.

Harvard allowed Maine nine power-play opportunities, and the Black Bears scored four times. Maine had a long five-on-three in the closing minutes that could have tied or won them the game, but the penalty killing came through at the end.

"[Harvard Head Coach Ronn Tomassoni] is stressing more discipline," Nielsen said. But "the win at Maine gives us a big boost."

Clarkson and St. Lawrence are separated by only one point in the ECAC standings, although they play vastly different styles of games and are going in completely different directions.

St. Lawrence has dropped four in a row, while Clarkson has won four straight.

The Saints don't give up many goals (three a game), but they don't score very many either, as they have lit the lamp three times or less in four of their six league games.

The Saints are returning only 13 players from last year's squad, and this lack of experience has shown up in the offensive production department.

The team's leading scorer is sophomore Burke Murphy, the first Saint to win the ECAC Rookie of the Year (in 1992). He has 15 points on 10 goals and 5 assists, while senior Mike Allain is the leading assists-man with 11.

A big disappointment so far has been the production of co-captain and fifth-year player Mark McGeough, who has amassed a grand total of one assist in 11 games.

The defense and goaltending, however, have been keeping the Saints competitive. Senior netminder Paul Spagnoletti has started every league game for St. Lawrence and will most likely play tonight. He has stopped 89.2 percent of the shots thrown his way.

Co-captain Mike McCourt keys the defense and is the fifth-leading scorer on the team with eight points.

Defending ECAC champion Clarkson, on the other hand, has been improving it still has allowed 3.98 goals a game over the ECAC season.

Junior defender Brian Mueller leads the team in scoring with 23 points and is the key to the power play (six power play goals) and penalty killing units.

On the other side of the blue line lies Finnish sensation Marko Tuomainen, a junior who was named a first-team ECAC All-Star last year. He has scored eight goals and assisted on 13 others this year. Senior Jason Currie has been the main man in net, stopping 88.9 percent of the shots thrown his way.

Harvard has its work cut out, as St. Lawrence and Clarkson are traditionally the toughest one-two punch a team will face on any given ECAC weekend.

These two teams on the US-Canada border in upstate New York world like nothing better than to knock off the ECAC front-runners, but Harvard should be ready to rumble.

"We're playing better now," Nielsen said. "With all the breaks that we've had, it will be good to play four games in the next two weeks." HARVARD, 7-6 at Portland, Maine Harvard  1  3  3  --  7 Maine  2  2  2  --  6

First Period

Maine--Latendresse (Ingraham, Purdie) 2:16. (PPG)

Harv--McCann (Martins, Maguire) 11:43. (PPG)

Maine--Tardif (Maclsaac) 17:11.

Second Period

Harv--Gustafson (Holmes, Nielsen) 2:31.

Harv--Gustafson (Holmes, Ferrari) 4:59.

Maine--Latendresse (Tardif, Allison) 14:14.(SHG)

Maine--Weinrich (Cardinal) 18:14. (PPG)

Harv--Baird (Lonsinger, Craigen) 19:56.

Third Period

Maine--Cardinal :55. (PPG)

Harv--Gustafson 2:38.

Maine--Roenick (Tardif, Cardinal) 6:51. (PPG)

Harv--Nielsen (Coughlin, Gustafson) 8:08.

Harv--Farrell (Maguire, Baird) 10:27. (PPG)

Saves:Harv--Israel 6-1 0 7, Tracy--0 3-7-10;

Maine--Marsh 5-9-4-18, Allison 0-7-0-7.

NCAA Poll 1. Michigan (26)  18-1-1  260 2. Lake Sup. St.  15-5-0  213 3. Wisconsin  12-5-1  189 4. Boston U.  11-4-0  183 5. UNH  13-3-1  170 6. N. Michigan  12-5-1  122 7. HARVARD  8-3-1  91 8. Colorado Coll.  12-4-2  80 9. RPI  7-5-0  34 10. Northeastern  10-3-2  32

Compiled by the Troy (N.Y.) Record with first-place votes in parentheses, records and total points.