The #20 University of Maine men’s hockey team scored three goals in the second period, with Sully Scholle getting credited with the eventual game winner in a 3-2 Hockey East win over Northeastern on Saturday night at the Tsongas Center in Lowell, Massachusetts.
The Huskies only had one shot on goal in the first period, outshot 12-1 by the Black Bears, but that one opportunity found the back of the net off the stick of Joe Connor at 9:24 for the first Northeastern lead of the weekend. Frank Djurasevic tied it for Maine at 1:31 of the second. Will Gerrior tracked down a puck behind the opposition net and played it around the boards and Djurasevic walked into a slap shot from just outside the right circle that he blasted into the cage. Djurasevic did it again less than three minutes later. This time it was Scholle feeding it to Djurasevic who fired a one-timer from the left circle that beat goaltender Lawton Zacher five-hole at 4:24. Scholle then got credited with the game winner at 14:24 as an attempted backhanded clearing pass by a Northeastern defenseman was mistakenly put into the Huskies net to make it 3-1. Giacomo Martino cut it back to a one goal deficit at 7:18 of the third period, but NU couldn’t find the equalizer despite pulling Zacher for an extra attacker with 2:02 left as Maine held on and for the first time this season sweeps back to back series against Hockey East opponents.
Connor had one goal and one assist in the loss for Northeastern. Zacher made 29 saves, as the Huskies fall to 15-17-1 and 10-13-0 in Hockey East. Along with the two goals from Djurasevic, Scholle would add one goal and one assist for Maine. Gerrior, Oskar Komarov, and Josh Nadeau added one assist each. Mathis Rousseau made 23 stops in net. The Black Bears went 0-1 on the powerplay and improved their record to 18-12-3 and 12-10-1 in conference play. Maine will take their four game win streak into their final regular season game at Vermont next Saturday at 7 p.m. With Providence College already clinching the regular season Hockey East Title, here are the standings 2-6 with games remaining for each team-
2nd Boston College- 39 points at UMass, vs Northeastern
3rd UConn- 38 points vs UNH
4th UMass- 37 points vs BC, at UNH
5th Maine- 36 points at Vermont
6th BU- 35 points at UMass-Lowell
