Mar 28, 2022
SUNY Geneseo’s Greg Koustomitis, left, shoots the puck toward the net while the University of New England’s Billy Girard (1) attempts to stop the puck and Collin Heinold lays down to block the shot during Friday’s NCAA DIII semifinal men’s hockey game in Lake Placid. (Enterprise photo — Parker O’Brien)
LAKE PLACID — It didn’t take long for the SUNY Geneseo Knights to feel right at home during the NCAA Division III men’s hockey semifinal game Friday night at the Olympic Center’s 1980 Herb Brooks Arena in Lake Placid.
The tournament’s closest team, geographically, to Lake Placid rifled in four goals on their first seven shots en route to defeating the University of New England Nor’Easters by a score of 8-3, to advance to the national champion for the first time in school history.
“The game plan was to keep it a tight scoring game. Let’s not get into the running of stuff and sure enough, the opposite happened,” SUNY Geneseo head coach Chris Schultz said. “We were excellent at finishing opportunities that were granted to us. Especially early on. The grade-A chances that we got, these guys put them home.”
The Knights’ Dan Bosio opened up the high scoring game when he collected a pass from his teammate Zach Rehbaum, before shooting the puck past the Nor’Easter’s netminder Billy Girard just five minutes into the game.
Five minutes later, UNE evened the game when Justin Dixson carried the puck from his own defensive zone to the offensive zone before making a cross-ice pass to Daniel Winslow, who was able to tap the puck into the back of the net.
Geneseo’s Levi Wunder, right, collides with University of New England’s Justin Dixson during Friday’s NCAA DIII semifinal game in Lake Placid.(Enterprise photo — Parker O’Brien)
Despite having just tied the game, the Nor’Easters gave Geneseo back-to-back powerplay opportunities, in which the Knights were able to capitalize on both chances. Bosio and senior defenseman Chris Perna were credited with the two goals which gave their team a 3-1 lead.
“That was not our game plan. We had hoped to play really good team defense tonight,” UNE head coach Kevin Swallow said. “Unfortunately, we didn’t play great team defense, but they’re such a good team offensively. They made us pay every single mistake we made.”
Right before the conclusion of the first period, Geneseo’s Peter Morgan collected a rebound before skating towards the front of the net and burying a five-hole goal to take a 4-1 lead.
“We were trying to expose the soft ice areas as much as possible. They run a similar defense as us, so we’re used to playing against them in practice all the time,” Schultz said. “They try out man in the corner, there’s a big area on the dots that’s open and we were able to expose that so.”
Less than two minutes into the middle period, Morgan picked up where he left off and converted a three-on-two break to put his team up by four.
After giving up four straight goals, UNE finally got its break when Austin Morgan made a cross-crease pass between two Knight’s defenders to find a wide-open Jared Christy, who tapped the puck into the back of the net.
“There was really no point in that game when we were like ‘hey this one is over,’” Swallow said. “There was a large part in that game where every guy in our room still believed. There was so many times this year where we got backed down and we bounced back. We had hoped that would happen tonight.”
With momentum starting to shift, the Nor’Easters thought they scored their third goal of the game. But, after further review the play started out offsides, keeping the score at 5-2.
“We were pretty high on the bench when they scored that. It made it a two-goal game there,” Swallow said. “We were excited there and then saw it go into review. That was a downer for sure.”
In the third period, Geneseo’s Tyson Gilmour put the game on ice, when he scored to make the game 6-2.
UNE’s Anthony Sciucco did score to make the game 6-3, but after Geneseo’s Matthew Doran and Alex Wilkins netted back-to-back goals, the lead was too much.
“Congratulations to that Geneseo team. They played a great hockey game today. They deserved to win,” Swallow said.
For the Nor’Easters, the loss ended their season with a record of 23-4-1.
“It’s been the most fun I’ve ever had playing hockey,” UNE captain Chris Jones said. “I’m just thankful that we were able to represent the University and really put it on a national scale.”
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