UM’s Allison stifles UNH> Bears vs. Vermont in final

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ORONO – Something had to give in Friday night’s Governors’ Cup Tournament semifinal between the University of Maine and the University of New Hampshire. After all, the two had battled to a pair of ties three weeks ago.

The Black Bears, who had led for only a couple of minutes in that series, bolted out to a 2-0 lead and then scored three unanswered goals later en route to a 6-3 victory.

Maine, 8-3-2, will face 7-1-1 Vermont, a 2-1 winner over UMass-Lowell, in Saturday’s 7 p.m. championship game.

UNH, now 4-5-2, will face 6-2-2 UMass-Lowell in the 4 p.m. consolation.

Sophomore right winger Shawn Wansborough scored a pair of goals for the Bears with Trevor Roenick, Tony Frenette, Dan Shermerhorn and Tim Lovell getting the others.

Shermerhorn, Roenick and Wansborough scored on the power play and Frenette netted a shorthanded goal.

Tim Murray, Mark Mowers and Eric Nickulas scored for UNH with Murray’s coming on the power play.

“The BU loss [5-2] put us in our place,” said Wansborough, who broke out of a mini-slump as he had just one goal in his last five games. “We realized we weren’t as good as we thought we were so everybody had to work harder.”

“Three weeks ago, UNH came in here and took five points from us. We weren’t happy with that and we felt we had something to prove,” said Maine goalie Blair Allison, who made 26 saves including 14 of the high-percentage variety. “We also knew they are going through some tough times off the ice and I think we took advantage of that.”

Allison was referring to the death of UNH defenseman Todd Hall’s younger sister in a recent car accident. In her memory, Hall is wearing her softball number, 12.

Allison made seven high-percentage stops in the first period to enable Maine to take a 2-0 lead into the first intermission.

“Allison was a major difference in the game,” said UNH coach Dick Umile. “I couldn’t believe we were down 2-0 after the first period. I don’t think they had a shot in the first 10 minutes.”

Shermerhorn and Wansborough found the back of the net just 1:07 apart late in the first period to give the Bears the lead for good.

Freshman defenseman David Cullen set up Shermerhorn’s goal with a nice rush down the right wing. He beat a UNH defenseman wide and slid it back to the low slot where Shermerhorn tucked a 10-footer behind UNH goalie Trent Cavicchi.

“Trevor was going to the net and I don’t think Cavicchi knew which one of us to take. I took a whack at it and it went five-hole,” said Shermerhorn, who added that the Maine coaches have stressed to the forwards that they go to the net hard.

Moments later, Brad Purdie fed Jason Mansoff at the left point for a low slap shot. Cavicchi made the save but Wansborough, standing at the top of the crease, jammed the rebound under him.

“The key to that goal was Jason hit the net with his shot,” said Wansborough. “We had been missing the net a lot.”

Murray got one back in the second period when his blast from the left point deflected off a Maine defenseman and skipped behind Allison.

But Roenick answered 6:14 later when he went hard to the front of the net and swept Shermerhorn’s bouncing centering pass under Cavicchi.

Tory set up Lovell’s goal with a nice cross-ice pass from the point. Lovell, cutting from right to left, beat Cavicchi with a 16-foot wrist shot.

Vermont 2, Lowell 1

University of Vermont junior goalie Tim Thomas was a second team All-American a year ago and he showed why on Friday afternoon.

Thomas made 32 saves, including 15 off Grade-A attempts, and junior right winger Matt Stelljes scored what proved to be the game-winner as Vermont nipped Lowell.

“Tim is unbelievable. He won this game for us,” said UVM junior captain Martin St. Louis.

“I didn’t play as well as I can because I let in a goal. But I was happy with the way I played,,” said Thomas. “I felt real good out there. I like to see a lot of shots.”

“We got a lot of shots but most of them were long shots. We weren’t getting to the front of the net,” said UMass-Lowell captain Jeff Daw. Maine 6, New Hampshire 3

New Hampshire (4-5-2) 0 1 2 – 3 Maine (8-3-2) 2 2 2 – 6

First period – 1. Maine, Shermerhorn 4 (Cullen), 17:31, PP; 2. Maine, Wansborough 8 (Purdie, Mansoff), 18:38. Penalties – UNH, Boguniecki, high sticking, 7:31; Maine, Cardinal, interference, 11:45; UNH, bench minor for too many men on the ice (served by Krog), 12:45; Maine, Tory, holding, 14:54; UNH, Cavicchi (served by Krog), tripping, 16:01; Maine, Shermerhorn, cross checking, 19:21.

Second period – 3. UNH, Murray 3 (Krog), 7:39, (pp); 4. Maine, Roenick 4 (Frenette, Shermerhorn), 13:53, (pp); 5. Maine, Lovell 8 (Tory), 16:46. Penalties – Maine, Libby, 6:26; UNH, Gagnon, holding, 9:31; Maine, Roenick, hitting from behind, 17:05; UNH, Gagnon, holding, 19:35; UNH, bench minor for unsportsmanlike conduct (served by McCready), 19:35.

Third Period – 6. Maine, Wansborough 9 (Lovell, Shermerhorn), 0:23, (pp); 7. UNH, Mowers 9 (Beakar, Hall), 5:23; 8. Maine, Frenette 5 (Lovell), 10:12; 9. UNH, Nickulas 8 (Hall), 14:10. Penalties – Maine, Shermerhorn, interference, 8:41

Shots on goal – UNH 9-8-12 – 29; Maine 8-10-7 – 25

Goalies – UNH: Cavicchi, Larochelle; Maine: Allison

Power-play opportunities – UNH: 1/6; Maine: 3/7

Vermont 2, UMass-Lowell 1

Vermont (7-1-1) 0 1 1 – 2 UMass-Lowell (6-2-2) 0 0 1 – 1

First period – No Scoring. Penalties – UML, Golden, interference, 1:50; UVM, Perrin, interference, 5:22; UVM, Lavoie, roughing, 8:19; UML, Mahoney, elbowing, 9:34; UVM, Kilbourne, interference, 12:26; UML, Salsman, unsportsmanlike conduct, 18:50

Second period – 1. UVM, Perrin (St. Louis), 11:34. Penalties – UVM, McKell, interference, 3:16; UML, Barozzino, boarding, 3:45; UML, Daw, interference, 6:18; UVM, Tremblay, interference, 9:58; UVM, Ruid, slash and unsportsmanlike conduct, 14:36; UML, Barozzino, slash and unsportsmanlike conduct, 14:36

Third period – 2. UVM, Stelljes (Patterson, McKell), 4:46; 3. UML, Mahoney (Barozzino, Sbrocca), 6:28. Penalties – UML, Mahoney, interference, 3:08; UVM, Martin, interference, 5:08; UVM, St. Louis, interference, 8:07

Shots on goal: Vermont 8-9-5 – 22; UMass-Lowell 13-6-14 – 33.

Goaltenders: Vermont, Tim Thomas; UMass-Lowell, Martin Fillion.

Power-play opportunities: Vermont 1-6, UMass-Lowell 1-7.