Trinity Men's Ice Hockey Stuns Middlebury
Middlebury, Vt. - The Trinity College Bantam men's ice hockey team scored three third period goals to break-up a scoreless tie on its way to a 3-1 road win over the Middlebury College Panthers in New England Small College Athletic Conference (NESCAC) men's ice hockey action this afternoon. The Panthers fall to 13-4-1 overall and 10-2-1 in NESCAC play, while the Bantams move to 12-5 overall and 9-4 in NESCAC play.
The game was scoreless through two periods, with both teams having some solid opportunities to score. Trinity's Wesley Vesprini (Lexington, Mass.) and Middlebury's Doug Raeder kept it a scoreless game as the Panthers held a 24-12 shots advantage through two periods of play. Vesprini made a big glove save on John Sullivan late in the second on a Middlebury power play, while robbing Charles Nerbak with a glove save midway through the second period.
Trinity broke through 3:35 into the third period with a breakaway goal. Freshman defenseman Mike DeMayo (Seaford, N.Y.) fed a pass up to senior co-captain forward Ryan Masucci (Winthrop, Mass.), who broke in all along and scored with a shot off the glove hand of Raeder. Middlebury answered just 1:49 later as Martin Drolet scored from the doorstep on a rebound after a shot from the top of the zone from Ian Drummond was saved. Only 1:39 later, Trinity regained the lead as Masucci made a pass from behind the net to Egor Petrov (Novokuznetsk, Russia), who rifled a blast to the top right corner of the net.
The Bantams made it a 3-1 game when Sean McCarthy (Duxbury, Mass.) found Richard Hollstein (Pembroke, Mass.) on the doorstep, and he quickly stuffed a shot home for a 3-1 lead at the 11:20 mark. Middlebury had a power play at 16:37 and pulled Raeder late, but were unable to cut into the lead. Trinity held a 16-11 shots advantage in the third period, as Vesprini made 34 saves in goal to earn the win. Raeder ended the night with 25 stops for the Panthers.
