HANOVER — After falling behind early, the Dartmouth men’s hockey team turned things around and picked up a 4-1 win against Colgate at Thompson Arena on Friday night in game one of a best-of-three ECAC quarterfinal series.
The stars were out for the No. 2-seeded Big Green as sophomore Hank Cleaves, sophomore Hayden Stavroff, and junior CJ Foley, all had multiple points on the night.
Cleaves found the back of the net twice, Stavroff scored once and added an assist, while Foley had two assists. Freshman Ryan Schelling also lit the lamp.
“I was pretty happy with the way we played,” said Foley. “I thought Colgate came out pretty hard and we answered the bell.”
The No. 7 seed Raiders opened the scoring about eight minutes into the contest when a shot from junior Jacob Napier ricocheted off junior Jake Schneider past Big Green junior goaltender Emmett Croteau, who was otherwise perfect on the night and finished with 20 saves.
It did not take long for the Big Green to respond. About four minutes later, Dartmouth tied the game on Schelling’s goal to make the game 1-1.
The stalemate lasted for the remainder of the first period and much of the second period as well. That was until the Big Green’s power play unit took the ice.
Late in the second frame, Colgate sophomore Michael Neumeier took a tripping penalty, and Dartmouth took full advantage.
With under a minute remaining on the clock, Cleaves scored his first goal of the night to give the Big Green a 2-1 advantage and all the momentum they needed heading into the third frame.
“It was huge,” Foley said of the power play goal. “A lot of plays happened to lead up to that, and we just kept building off of each shift… we ran with it from there.”
The Big Green wasted little time in the third period, building on their lead. Stavroff, the nation’s leading goal scorer coming into the matchup, scored his 28th of the year within the first two minutes to put his squad up 3-1.
Dartmouth’s special teams came up big again shortly after — this time on the penalty kill. Around 15 seconds after Stavroff’s goal, the Big Green took a penalty but was able to escape unscathed.
Then, five minutes later, Cleaves scored his second of the night to put Dartmouth up 4-1, and that was all she wrote for Colgate.
“That kill when it was 3-1, and now we take a penalty, and it’s early in the third — I thought that was a really impressive job from those guys of those guys doing what Jason Tapp (Associate Head Coach) and I put in because that could have really shifted momentum,” Dartmouth Head Coach Reid Cashman said. “Really proud of our special teams tonight.”
With the win, Dartmouth leads the three-game series 1-0 and will look to put Colgate away back at Thompson Arena on Saturday at 7 p.m.
“It’s really hard to end somebody’s season. We know that they’re a really well-coached team, they have some really good players — they’re going to come back and have a plan,” Cashman said. “We’re going to have to be better tomorrow than we were today.”