Feb. 20, 2010

Box Score

Coach MacDonald's postgame interview

Audio Recap - The River Hawk Report - February 23, 2010

The UMass Lowell River Hawks (16-14-2, 10-11-2 HE) secured a thrilling 4-2 victory in the Alfond Arena against the Maine Black Bears (15-12-3, 12-9-2 HE) on Saturday night. The win was only UMass Lowell's third since 2000 when playing in Orono and saw senior winger Kory Falite (Billerica, MA) surpass the 100 career points mark.

In an eerie reminder of last night, the Black Bears potted the first goal under odd circumstances. While on the power play, Gustav Nyquist (Malmo, Sweden) set up Maine captain Jeff Dimmen (Colorado Springs, CO) for a shot at the point. Dimmen muffed his swing, catching only a piece of the puck and it slide ever-so-slowly under two defenders who lined up to block the shot. Goaltender Carter Hutton (Thunder Bay, Ont.) found himself screened by his own men and never saw the puck as it crept by him for the game's opening goal at 12:12 into the period.

The Maine lead was short lived as the River Hawks erased the deficit just over two minutes later. Also on the power play, Scott Campbell (Navan, Ont.) won the face-off and sent it back to Ryan Blair (Ashburn, VA) at the point. Blair opted for a hard shot that was saved by Scott Darling (Lemont, IL), but freshman Colin Wright (Burlington, Ont.) crashed the net and knocked in the rebound. The score at 14:34 in the first was Wright's sixth goal of the season.

After a nearly dead even second period of play, it seemed the score was destined to remain tied after UMass Lowell came up empty on a late power play. Despite the man advantage ending, the River Hawks continued to attack the net and the hard work paid off. Falite received the puck from Jeremy Dehner (Madison, WI) behind the net and skated towards the corner before firing a centering pass to Riley Wetmore (Swanton, VT) in the slot. Wetmore's one-timer beat Darling between the legs and gave UMass Lowell a 2-1 lead with only 20 seconds left in the period.

Falite's assist on the play was his 100th career point, making him the 39th player in program history to crack triple digits. He is the first River Hawk to join the exclusive club since Andrew Martin in 2006.

As it turned out, Falite was just warming up and went on to score a goal of his own at the start of the third period. Ben Holmstrom (Colorado Springs, CO) stopped the puck along the boards and knocked it loose to Patrick Cey (Saskatoon, Sask.) to take in for a shot. Cey's shot was saved, but Falite cleaned up the rebound to extend UMass Lowell's lead to 3-1.

The goal proved vital as Maine would not go down without a fight. Nyqusit set up Brian Flynn (Lynnfield, MA) for his sixth goal of the weekend, cutting the River Hawk lead to 3-2.

Falite responded with one more score to regain the comfortable lead with just over six and a half minutes remaining. Barry Goers (Ivyland, PA) and Wright sent the puck up the board for Falite who reeled off a shot into the mesh. The pair of goals were Falite's 15th and 16th of the season.

River Hawks goalie Hutton picked up his 10th win of the season after making 24 saves and killing off four of the Black Bears' five power play opportunities. Maine's Darling made 27 saves in the losing effort, falling to 15-5-3 on the campaign. UMass Lowell outshot the Black Bears, 31-26.

The River Hawks will look to carry to positive momentum into next weekend's home-and-home series with Providence College (10-18-2, 5-16-2 HE). UMass Lowell will play host on Friday night before traveling to Rhode Island on Saturday; both games are scheduled for a 7 p.m. start.