Hockey Comes Up Short on Home Ice

It was a bittersweet ceremony for the seniors of the Harvard men’s hockey team Saturday night, who celebrated the last regular-season home game of their careers with their families after a heartbreaking 4-2 loss to Colgate at Bright Hockey Center.

Interestingly, on Senior Night it was the freshmen that led the Crimson (13-13-6, 10-8-2 ECAC) in the loss to the Raiders (7-17-3, 7-10-3), as goals from freshman forward Luke Greiner and classmate Danny Biega at opportune moments kept Harvard within striking distance of Colgate.

“[The freshmen] have played a large part consistently throughout the year,” captain Alex Biega said. “Once again, they gave us a chance to battle back, and we rely on them a great deal. Hopefully they can keep contributing throughout the rest of the season and going into the playoffs.”

The Crimson’s seniors were named to the starting lineup, and fourth-year goaltender John Riley made his first start at home—the third of his career.

“I think our guys went after it, left it on the ice, and worked hard,” said Harvard coach Ted Donato ’91. “I feel bad on Senior Night that we weren’t able to get the win.”

The Raiders jumped out to an early lead with a goal at 4:40 into the first from sophomore forward Austin Smith.

At the start of the second, junior goaltender Kyle Richter replaced Riley in net. Colgate dominated the Crimson offensively in that period, leading in shots on goal, 20-13. With such constant offensive pressure, the Raiders stretched their lead to two, as junior forward Brian Day found the back of the net. Day’s lobbed shot floated into the goal following a pileup in front of the net.

After a brief stoppage in play due to an ankle injury to one of the officials, Greiner netted a goal of his own at 10:48 of the second. Colgate’s Jason Williams fell to start the play, creating a man-up scenario for Harvard at the other end of the rink. Greiner was able to capitalize on the advantage, assisted by junior forward Michael Del Mauro and Richter. Williams redeemed himself with the game-winner at 10:40 in the third. Now down 3-1, the Crimson turned on its offensive firepower, outshooting the Raiders by a margin of six in the period.

Danny Biega came up big for Harvard at 12:57 in the third, putting his team within a goal once again with a slapshot from behind the circle. The Crimson pulled its goalkeeper with a minute left in the game and created several scoring opportunities in that last minute, including a near-miss by sophomore forward Alex Killorn with less than 30 seconds to play.

With 13.4 seconds remaining, the tension peaked on a Colgate timeout, as Harvard knew it would have one last chance to tie up the game. Unfortunately for the Crimson, the strong third-period team effort was not enough to carry it to a victory, as its last opportunity was snuffed out by the Raider defense. Colgate sealed the deal with an empty-net goal to put them up by two with two seconds left to play. Despite impressive goaltending from both Riley and Richter, the early hole would never completely close.

“The ice is tough in those last 30 seconds,” Donato said. “But I thought we moved the puck around a little better [than Friday night], and we generated more shots.”

Colgate and Harvard ranked sixth and eighth in the ECAC, respectively, before Saturday’s meeting. After the Raiders and Dartmouth battled to a 6-6 tie on Friday night, Colgate heads into the final week of the regular season on a solid 1-0-1 weekend. Only the top eight teams in the ECAC earn home-ice advantage for the upcoming tournament, so next week’s away games are must-wins for the Crimson.

“We’re in the driver’s seat,” Donato said. “Nobody can take home ice away from us, from the sounds of it, if we go out and win two games next weekend, so that’s the challenge.”