The men’s hockey team (6-11-0) had two conference matches this weekend against ECAC East opponents, taking on New England College Pilgrims (8-8-2) on Friday and St. Anselm College Hawks (8-7-1) on Saturday. After dropping the first game of the weekend to the Pilgrims, the Cardinals rebounded and pulled out a solid victory against St. Anselm to end the weekend on a high note. Wesleyan is now 3-10-0 in league play, but the Cardinals will have a chance to improve that record in the next two weeks as they take on four NESCAC opponents.
On Friday night, the Cardinals faced off against New England College, which had defeated Middlebury 7-4 and dropped a narrow 3-2 decision to Williams in its last two games. These two teams sit third and second in the NESCAC standings, respectively, and the Cardinals had their work cut out for them. Wesleyan started the match off on a strong note, with Anthony DePietto ’11 kicking off the scoring action at the 10:20 mark of the first. However, this lead quickly evaporated as the Pilgrims capitalized on their man-up situations, scoring on two power plays in the first and one in the second. Heading into the third, the Cards were down 3-1 when DiPietto lit the lamp for the second time that night, scoring on a power-play at the 1:31 mark of the period to halve the Cardinals’ deficit. The Pilgrims quickly answered with a goal of their own, however, to stretch their lead to the eventual final score of 4-2. The Cardinals led the Pilgrims in shots on goal in the contest, 36-34, but the difference hinged on man-up situations, with the Pilgrims converting on three of their seven power-play opportunities (a .429 conversion percentage) compared to Wesleyan’s 1-for-7 (.143) showing.
On Saturday, the Cardinals faced off against the St. Anselm Hawks, a team they had defeated last year for one of the team’s four wins. The first period did not see any scoring but there were quite a few shots on goal, including 17 from Wesleyan and 11 more from St. Anselm. The Hawks scored the first goal of the night at the 9:04 mark of the second, but Wesleyan answered with two goals of their own to end the period with a 2-1 advantage. The Hawks evened the game in the third with a power-play goal at the 10:38 mark, but in the final 10 minutes of the match the Cardinals scored three goals to earn a 5-2 victory. Co-captain Sam Robinson ’10 got things started with an unassisted tally with 5:11 to go, and Adam Kaiser ’13 made it 4-2 with 1:19 left. Brett Bandazian ’12 added an empty-netter with 50 seconds left to conclude the scoring. Tim Archibald ’10, seeing his first action since an 8-0-blowout loss against Norwich the previous weekend, stopped 40 of 42 shots between the pipes, posting an impressive .950 save percentage to help the Cardinals secure this key victory.
The Cardinals’ next action comes Friday and Saturday as they take on Tufts and Connecticut College on the road.
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