Men’s hockey (13–9–3 overall, 10–5–3 NESCAC) defeated the Williams College Ephs (14–9–2 overall, 10–6–2 NESCAC) on Saturday, Feb. 23 in the NESCAC Quarterfinal game.
The win was their fifth in six games, and they have not lost in the last six games (5–0–1.) With the win, Hamilton will advance to the semifinal round on the road against Trinity College (17–3–5 overall, 12–2–4 NESCAC.)
The game began with a fairly slow first period until passes from Ian Nichols ’19 and Sean Allen ’21 found the stick of Jason Brochu ’19, whose shot from the faceoff dot hit the back bar of the goal to make the score 1–0 with just over a minute left in the first period. A deflection from the Ephs midway through the second evened the score, and Williams pulled ahead with another goal in the second.
The third period opened with Williams leading 2–1. Opportunity came right away as Hamilton gained the man advantage 1:06 into the third period. Joey Moore ’22 and Bennett Morrison ’20 set up a sweet play that resulting in a shot on goal. Though the shot was deflected by the Ephs goaltender, Jon Beniers ’21 collected the rebound for his fourth goal of the season.
Hamilton scored its last goal of regulation about halfway through the period to take the lead. A Continentals faceoff win from Moore gave the puck to Nick Ursitti ’20, who cut through defense and passed the puck back to Moore again. His one-timer got past the Williams goaltender to pull ahead 3–2 and Moore buried his second goal of the season.
With Williams one goal behind, they signaled for their goaltender to skate to the bench to put an extra attacked on the ice. Before the goaltender could make it off the ice, Williams scored with just over a minute left in regulation. The clock wound down with the score 3–3. Normally, NESCAC hockey goes into a 5-minute overtime when regulation play ends in a tie. Overtimes are sudden death, and if neither team wins in overtime, the game results in a tie. However, since playoff games cannot end in ties, playoff games involve successive 20-minute sudden-death overtime periods.
The 20-minute overtime period began with energy high and the stands full. Minutes passed with quality scoring chances from both teams, but the match wasn’t decided until just over nine minutes into the overtime period. Allen, with his second assist of the game, passed to Brochu, who cut the defense beautifully and scored off of a five-hole shot. The goal was Brochu’s 11th of the season, bringing his total up to 22 points. He leads the team in both of those categories for the Continentals.
Notably, goaltender Anthony Tirabassi ’20 saved an astounding 47 of 49 shots during the 69 minutes of play. For his picture-perfect overtime goal, Brochu was named the NESCAC Men’s Hockey Player of the Week for the week of Monday, Feb. 25. It is the second time that Brochu has won the award. He has the fourth-most game-winning goals in the NESCAC and is tied for fifth place with 11 goals as well.
In addition, Brochu and stand-out first-year Nick Rutigliano ’22 were named to the All-NESCAC second team, which honors exemplary players around the NESCAC. Rutigliano is third in defenseman scoring and third for first-year scoring.
Hamilton will take on Trinity College at their rink this weekend in the NESCAC semifinals. Trinity is a tough opponent, and as juniors and seniors will remember, Hamilton lost an overtime heartbreaker when they faced Trinity at home in the NESCAC finals in 2017. Earlier this season, Hamilton tied with Trinity while at home with a score of 3–3 on Friday, Jan. 25. Trinity is ranked #7 nationally and is the #1 seed in the NESCAC.
The game is Saturday, March 2 in Hartford, C.T. at 4:30 PM. The game will be livestreamed on the NESCAC and Hamilton Athletics websites.
