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Princeton University Athletics
Princeton University
Maine
Players Mentioned
Princeton Falls Short in 3-2 OT Thriller at Maine
November 28, 2015 | Men's Ice Hockey
BOX SCORE
ORONO, Maine (11/28/15) - Blaine Byron scored at 2:56 in overtime to lift Maine to a 3-2 win over Princeton in men's hockey on Saturday night at Alfond Arena. The Tigers rallied from a two-goal deficit to force overtime.
A Princeton penalty 48 seconds into overtime gave Maine the offense it needed and the Black Bears carried it into the game-winning goal, scoring just eight seconds after the penalty expired. Byron scored his second of the night, going backdoor on a pass from Cam Brown inside the right circle.
Princeton was called for six penalties in the game, while Maine was sent to the box just once. A third of Maine's shots came during the power play, 20 of 50.
“I think we were resilient to come back and fought through a good onslaught of Maine pressure,” Princeton head coach Ron Fogarty said. “Colton did extremely well. They had 20 special team shots and he stopped a lot of them. He was the difference for us to be in the game.”
Freshman Ryan Kuffner who scored the game-tying goal and assisted on the team's first credited Phinney and the defense for the rally.
“Phinney played unbelievable to keep us in it the whole way and let us start the offense from the defensive zone,” Kuffner said. “The defense was able to jump up into the rush and help us go all the way down. Véronneau was able to slide one in and Teves made a great play on the second goal. I think it was key for the defense to come up into the rush and help us execute our game plan a little better.”
Byron put his team on the board at 11:48 of the first with help from Steven Swavely. Byron got around his defender and pulled Princeton netminder Colton Phinney to the right side before shooting into the left, and colliding with Phinney in the process.
After the second period got underway with junior Ben Foster hitting the pipe, Kuffner had two great scoring chances to even the game. The first game at 12:17 when he was at the right post and the second was on a drive after getting a backhanded pass from the boards at 15:10.
It was Maine's Dan Renouf that would find the back of the net first though, scoring a power-play goal at 17:13. Renouf fired from the high slot over the left shoulder of Phinney.
The Tigers continued to generate chances and a breakaway by freshman Alex Riche had the fans at Alfond on their feet, but a toe save by Matt Morris kept the Orange & Black at bay.
Morris wouldn't be as lucky the next time a Princeton freshman came at him one-on-one. Max Véronneau picked up a pass from Kuffner in the neutral zone and skated in with two defenders on his tail and beat Morris glove side to cut it to a one-goal game at 6:33 of the third.
Three minutes later, freshman Josh Teves fired through traffic to force Morris to make a difficult shot. Junior Garrett Skrbich had a backhanded shot in the slot and senior Kyle Rankin was at the near post but couldn't finish off the rebound as the Tigers kept knocking at the door.
The hard work paid off when Kuffner buried a Teves rebound to knot the game at 2-2 at 15:25.
Phinney's best saves of the third period came on shots from Brown. He made back-to-back stops on him during the final penalty kill of the period and then stuffed him at the right post less than a minute after Kuffner's tying goal. Phinney finished the game with 47 saves, four short of matching his career best.
“We played well again. It was the same thing as last night, it could have gone either way,” Phinney said. “I only had to make a few tough saves, one was on the power play with an extra guy, other than that our guys did a good job and made a lot of blocks and made it easier for me.”
Morris stopped 31 shots to help Maine win its fourth straight game and improve to 4-8-3 overall.
Princeton, now 2-8, returns to ECAC play next weekend, Dec. 4 & 5 when it travels to Brown and Yale. Game times are both at 7 p.m.