PROVIDENCE, RI – In the first leg of a home and home series against the #14 Providence Friars, the #8 Northeastern Huskies fell 4-1 and allowed two short-handed goals in the first period.
The Huskies got off to a hot start in Schneider Arena when junior defenseman Ryan Shea scored his first goal of the season at the 2:45 mark in the first period..
After that however, it was all Friars. Six minutes later, Providence tied the game up after controlling play in the Northeastern’s end with a goal from their most offensively productive defenseman, junior Jacob Bryson. Later in the first period, Providence then tallied two shorthanded goals on back-to-back Northeastern power plays. Both of the shorthanded goals came off of defensive mistakes by Northeastern trying to keep pucks inside the Friars’ zone. The first was scored by junior forward Kasper Bjorkqvist and the second by sophomore forward Jason O’Neill.
In the second period, the Friars continued to dominate putting 16 shots on sophomore goaltender Cayden Primeau, who stood strong and kept Northeastern in this game for the entire 60 minutes. Conversely, Northeastern barely tested Providence goalie Hayden Hawkey and were only able to generate one shot in the entire period.
Going into the 3rd period only down 3-1, Northeastern started to show signs of life offensively. However, their effort came too little too late as Northeastern was unable to score on either their late power play chance or their extra attacker sequence with Primuea on the bench. Sophomore forward Greg Printz scored an empty netter to ice the game 4-1.
These two teams will face off again tomorrow night at Historic Matthews Arena, with puck drop scheduled for 7 p.m. Joe Barbito and Dale Desantis will have the call with pregame coverage starting at 6:45.