Suffolk University’s men’s hockey team hosted the nationally ranked University of New England Nor’Easters in East Boston on Feb. 3, with the Rams unable to beat the Nor’Easters in Commonwealth Coast Conference play.
The Rams fell to 6-12-2 on the season and 4-11-1 in conference play with the defeat. It marks their second straight loss and fifth in six games after a previous four game win streak. The Rams are now just 1-10-1 against UNE all time, including 0-3-0 this season.
“I thought the team played really well,” said head coach Shawn McEachern when asked about the game. “I think we made a couple mistakes and they got some real good players up front, they scored on their opportunities and we couldn’t put it away on our opportunities.”
The Nor’Easters struck first when Logan DiScanio found the back of the net early in the game. With less than a minute left in the first period, junior Kyle Valiquette scored his second goal of the season, giving Suffolk the equalizer to make it 1-1 after 20 minutes.
After that, the Nor’Easters took over on the scoresheet, scoring one goal in the second period and one goal in the third to wrap up the win, with Suffolk unable to crack UNE’s Joe Stanizzi more than once. Stanizzi made 33 saves in the win for the Nor’Easters.
Senior goalie Jarret Bovarnick was the starter for the Rams, starting his second game of the season and appearing in his fifth. Bovarnick made 30 saves in between the pipes to keep his team in the game all night.
“He came out and cut off the angles really well, his rebound control was good,” said McEachern on Bovarnick’s performance. “I was just really happy for him to get in there and have a good performance.
Suffolk skaters took five penalties on the night and were able to keep UNE off the scoreboard with five successful penalty kills. The Rams couldn’t score when they had the man advantage however, with UNE stopping all seven Suffolk power plays.
“Our defense did a great job blocking shots and our forwards pressured really well,” said McEachern on the perfect penalty kill. “That’s a tough team to kill against, to come out of that game and not give up any power play goals was a good performance for us.”
The Rams resume play next weekend, hitting the road to face the Salve Regina Seahawks on Feb. 10 before welcoming the Endicott College Gulls to East Boston on Feb. 11 as the regular season begins to wind down.
“I think going forward, especially next weekend, it’s to play with good structure and focus for the full 60 minutes,” said McEachern on what needs to improve down the stretch. “We did that against UNE and I think if we do that consistently we’ll get better results.”
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