A hot start for the Dartmouth men’s hockey team was not enough to put away Yale, as the Bulldogs fought back to force a 4-4 tie Friday night in New Haven, Conn. The Big Green salvaged an extra point by winning the shootout.
With under 10 seconds remaining in regulation, Dartmouth — which had beaten Yale twice this season, 6-1 — looked poised to pick up its third win over the Bulldogs.
That changed when Yale’s Julian Frias scored with about eight seconds left to tie the game at 4-4 and force overtime.
Neither team scored in the extra period, setting up a shootout. Nikita Nikora’s goal — the shootout’s only tally — gave Dartmouth the extra point, though the game counts as a tie in the standings.
“I think we were inconsistent,” Big Green coach Reid Cashman said. “I think we had moments that we really played to our identity and really liked how we played, and then too many inconsistent moments. We made too many mistakes.”
The nation’s eighth-ranked scoring offense played to its identity in the first period. With 11:30 left in the first, the Big Green capitalized on a power play when Hank Cleaves scored on a redirect, assisted by Nikora and CJ Foley, for a 1-0 lead.
Just over a minute later, Joshua Schenk, assisted by Austin Salani and Ryan Schelling, made it 2-0.
The start mirrored Dartmouth’s previous two matchups with Yale this season, when the Big Green jumped to 6-0 leads en route to victory.
But Friday was different. Yale’s Joe Blackley scored with about 5½ minutes left in the first period to cut the deficit to 2-1.
Dartmouth extended its lead to 3-1 about 4½ minutes into the second period on an unassisted goal by Schenk.
“He’s consistently one of our hardest workers, one of our more selfless players, and it’s always exciting to see someone like that get rewarded,” Cashman said.
The lead didn’t last. Yale scored twice before the second period ended to tie the game at 3-3.
Dartmouth regained the lead about eight minutes into the third period when Matt Fusco, assisted by Nikora and Jack Silverberg, made it 4-3. But the Big Green couldn’t hold on.
The result added to Dartmouth’s road struggles. The Big Green are 4-5-1 away from Thompson Arena this season, compared with 13-1-1 at home.
Despite the discrepancy, Cashman said, “It’s not a huge concern for me as far as I don’t think the road is affecting the consistency of our performance.”
Dartmouth, ranked No. 12 in the latest USCHO.com poll, is 17-6-2 overall and 11-4-2 in conference play. The Big Green played at Brown on Saturday and fell 4-3. They will travel to RPI on Friday.