The night after its best offensive game of the season, Cornell’s offense went cold in the last game of its six game season opening road trip. The Red (2-4, 2-2 ECAC) fell behind early and never recovered in a 4-1 loss to Clarkson (5-6, 3-1 ECAC).
The Red dug itself an early hole. The Golden Knights scored just over a minute into the game, launching a deep shot in transition shortly after entering their offensive zone for the first time of the game.
The Golden Knights extended their lead three and a half minutes into the game on a power play on a shot from the blue line that sophomore Ian Shane got a piece of but could not keep out of the net.
The Golden Knights maintained their 2-0 lead midway through the second period after killing three Cornell power plays and getting kept off the board on two of their own. With seven and a half minutes left in the second period, the Golden Knights extended their lead to 3-0 by scoring their second power play goal on their fourth try of the night.
The goal chased Shane from the game. Shane finished with seven saves on 10 shots. He was replaced by freshman goaltender Remington Keopple, who stopped all six shots that he faced.
Cornell had a good opportunity to cut into the deficit after Clarkson was assessed a five minute major penalty in the final minute of the second period. A holding penalty on sophomore forward Ondrej Psenicka in Cornell’s offensive zone erased two minutes of the advantage, and the Red could not capitalize on the rest.
The Red finished 0-5 on power play opportunities.
Cornell finally got on the board with 11 minutes left in the game when senior forward Zach Tupker’s shot from the blue line trickled through Clarkson’s Ethan Haider’s five hole. Haider’s vision was blocked by sophomore defenseman Tim Rego.
Tupker’s goal did not spark a comeback for the Red. Cornell was awarded a power play a minute after Tupker’s goal but four blocked shots by Clarkson kept Cornell from pulling within one.
Cornell pulled Keopple with two minutes left but could not make anything happen with an extra attacker. Clarkson iced the game with an empty net goal with 16 seconds left.
After a 2-4 road trip to start the season, the Red will make its home debut next weekend against Brown and Yale.