ORONO – It was only appropriate that a senior score the most important goal of the game on Seniors Night at Alfond Arena Saturday.
Co-captain and right wing John Ronan’s shorthanded goal with just one second remaining in the second period supplied the University of Maine men’s hockey team with its first lead and early third-period goals by Brent Shepheard and Michel Leveille provided an important cushion as the Bears beat UMass Lowell 5-3 before a sellout crowd of 5,641.
The Bears, winners of three in a row including Friday night’s 2-0 triumph over UML, sewed up a home-ice berth for the Hockey East Tournament quarterfinals in two weekends. Maine, which extended its home unbeaten streak to 11 games (8-0-3), is now 18-10-6 overall, 13-5-4 in Hockey East.
The River Hawks fell to 19-9-4 and 10-9-3, respectively, while suffering their first back-to-back losses since Nov. 19-20. Maine swept the three-game regular-season series.
“Any time you can win on Seniors Night, it’s always special,” said Ronan, one of five seniors honored before and after the game along with Troy Barnes, Mat Deschamps, Ben Murphy, and Matt Greyeyes. “This was a big conference win and NCAA win.”
Ronan, who had tied the game 1-1, put the Bears ahead to stay soon after corralling the puck in the neutral zone.
“I poked it by their defenseman to [Jon] Jankus and he one-touched it back to me. Then I beat a guy [Elias Godoy] wide for the first time in my college career, [took a shot] and the puck trickled in somehow,” said Ronan, who cut from left to right across the low slot and wristed it far side.
“He beat me between my glove and my pad,”
said UML freshman goalie Peter Vetri. “It was a terrible goal on my part. It was a good move by him.”
“You couldn’t pick a worse nightmare,” said UML coach Blaise MacDonald.
“That took some wind out of their sails and lifted up our team. He really led by example there. It was a great goal,” said Maine coach Tim Whitehead.
Maine sophomore left wing Brent Shepheard extended his goal-scoring streak to four games with his third consecutive game-winner 3:54 into the third period after receiving the puck from Bret Tyler inside his own blue line and going coast-to-coast with it.
“I had some room, got some speed up, and their first forechecker was kind of flat-footed,” said Shepheard. “I made a move around him and the puck got away from me a bit. Their defenseman was going to chip it and I just pulled it back to the middle and it was pretty much one-on-one with the goalie after that. I cut across the net and put it low blocker side. I saw Ronan score that way.”
Leveille scored 2:36 later when he one-timed a Greg Moore pass “low blocker side,” according to Leveille, from the middle of the slot.
“Instead of just sitting back with the lead in the third period, we attacked and got a couple of goals right away. That was big,” said Ronan.
Godoy’s second screened power-play one-timer from the top of the circle cut it to 5-3 1:28 later, but Maine goalie Jimmy Howard was terrific down the stretch, making eight of his 31 saves in the final 4:27 after MacDonald pulled Vetri in favor of the extra attacker.
The dynamic Jason Tejchma opened the scoring for UML in the first period with a shorthanded breakaway backhander after blocking a Mike Lundin shot, but Ronan answered 2:05 into the second with a one-handed redirection of a Jankus wrister.
Godoy’s first goal regained the lead 48 seconds later, but Derek Damon equalized with his first goal in 10 games as he one-timed a Mike Hamilton pass over Vetri’s glove from the high slot.
Damon’s goal came just 20 seconds after Howard prevented UML from gaining a 3-1 lead by robbing Godoy on a breakaway backhander.
“He made a great move on me. He had me beat. I just threw my leg across and I got a piece of it,” said Howard.
“I had him down, but I couldn’t get it up. He got his toe on it. He made an unreal save,” said Godoy.
Maine outshot UMass Lowell 36-34.
BLACK BEARS 5, RIVER HAWKS 3
UMass Lowell (19-9-4) 1 1 1 – 3
Maine (18-10-6) 0 3 2 – 5
First period – 1. UML, Tejchma 10 (unassisted), 9:40 (sh). Penalties: UML, Kinley, obstruction-holding, 2:39; Maine, Shepheard, elbowing, 3:35; UML, Kinley, obstruction-interference, 9:17; UML, Godoy, obstruction-interference, 14:52
Second period – 2. Maine, Ronan 9 (Jankus, Soares), 2:05; 3. UML, Godoy 11 (Kinley, O’Brien), 2:53 (pp); 4. Maine, Damon 12 (Hamilton), 5:15; 5. Maine, Ronan 10 (Jankus), 19:59 (sh). Penalties: Maine, Bellamy, obstruction interference, 2:18; Maine, Bellamy, charging, 19:00
Third period – 6. Maine, Shepheard 11 (Tyler), 3:54; 7. Maine, Leveille 9 (Moore, Shepheard), 6:30; 8. UML, Godoy 12 (O’Brien, Walter), 7:58 (pp). Penalties: UML, Collar, obstruction-interference, 2:57; UML, Godoy, contact to the head-roughing, 4:26; Maine, Soares, boarding, 6:56; UML, Tejchma, holding, 15:25; Maine, Ramsey, roughing, 15:25
Shots on goal: UML 9-12-13-34; Maine 17-11-8-36
Goaltenders: UML, Vetri (36 shots-31 saves); Maine, Howard (34-31)
Power-play opportunities: UML 2 of 4; Maine 1 of 5
High-percentage scoring chances: UML 7-3-8-18; Maine 12-10-4-26
Attendance: 5,641 (sellout)
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