This story has been updated.
With 9:27 left in the game, Colgate senior Brett Chorske had his head held low, trying to catch his breath.
His team was down 2-0 midway through the third. It had just finished a power play stretch that spanned over three minutes.
The Raiders had even pulled its goaltender to spark any kind of offense. Multiple times over that stretch, Chorske — an All-ECAC first team selection — was kept at bay by the Cornell defense.
The Red blocked 11 shots in the third period.
That was enough to send the Red to Lake Placid for the third consecutive season.
“All in all, just a gritty kind of win for us,” said head coach Mike Schafer ’86.
Men’s hockey defeated Colgate, 3-0, in game two of the ECAC quarterfinals, sweeping the Raiders and advancing to ECAC championship weekend. It is the Red’s third sweep in the quarterfinals in as many years.
“It’s pretty special,” said junior forward Dalton Bancroft about returning to Lake Placid. Bancroft has made the trip in each of his three seasons. “Once you get there, anything [can] happen. It’s one-game elimination.
While Friday’s game was a relatively disciplined contest on both sides, Saturday’s game produced a total of 20 minutes of minor penalties.
In addition to Cornell’s stingy shot-blockers, senior goaltender Ian Shane was perfect between the pipes, making 18 saves on 18 Raider shots. With the shutout, he passed Ken Dryden ’69 to sit all alone in fourth place for the most shutouts by any Cornell netminder with 14.
“This was a series four years in the making for the 10 of us [seniors],” Shane said. “To come out of this, obviously with a sweep, feels good with the way things went our freshman year losing to Colgate in three [games].”
With its season on the line, Colgate skated out with more vigor than it did on Friday, but it was dealt a nearly identical result.
Just over six minutes into the game, senior forward Sullivan Mack executed a highlight-reel spin-o-rama move to break into the offensive zone before forcing the puck on net. The puck just barely eked through Colgate goaltender Andrew Takacs, giving Cornell a 1-0 lead in back-to-back games.
The Red had little time to celebrate its opening tally when senior forward Kyler Kovich was nabbed for tripping just 10 seconds after Mack lit the lamp.
On Friday, Colgate scored its only goal on its first and only power play. On Saturday, the Raiders went 0/7 on the power play, the first being on that Kovich penalty.
“They did a tremendous job,” Schafer said about the penalty kill unit. “Ian I thought played really, really well.”
After the successful kill, Cornell regained control. With just over three minutes left in the first period, sophomore defenseman Hoyt Stanley had a stretch of excellent play, first nearly doubling the score on a wide-open shot to the net before a Colgate skater poked it away, before recovering for a diving block in the defensive zone to preserve the lead.
The Red entered the first intermission with the slim lead. It would enter the second intermission with that same 1-0 lead.
The second period came not without its chances — three penalties were called in the middle frame, with one Colgate call sandwiched between two Cornell infractions.
Another Kovich tripping penalty sent Colgate back to the man advantage 3:54 into the period. This time around, Shane was forced to make a couple of stellar stops, mitigating second-chance opportunities by playing aggressively on rebounds.
Cornell even got a shorthanded chance on that penalty kill, with senior forward Ondrej Psenicka emerging on a two-on-one rush with sophomore forward Jonathan Castagna, but a failed pass prevented the puck from finding the net.
Nearly 10 minutes passed before the next penalty, called on Colgate’s 6’7” forward Brett Chorske for interference. Cornell was once again stymied on the power play thanks to Colgate’s aggressive penalty killers, with the Raiders even getting a shorthanded chance that was padded away by Shane.
A late penalty taken by Castagna sent Cornell back to the penalty kill for a third time, but Colgate couldn’t find the back of the net despite some of its best chances of the night.
Though Colgate earned two power plays in period two, Cornell ultimately outshot the Raiders 10-4 in the middle frame.
Continuing the theme of penalty-ridden play, Colgate — 20 minutes away from having its season ended — had a skater in the box within two minutes of the third period’s start.
The third power play of the night would be the charm. Freshman forward Charlie Major beat Takacs to double the lead with 15:49 left and give him his fifth point against Colgate in four games.
But just a couple minutes later, chaos would ensue. First, sophomore defenseman Ben Robertson was sent off for interference, before senior defenseman Hank Kempf was nabbed for elbowing with 47 seconds left on Robertson’s penalty.
It was set up to be a five-on-three Raider advantage, but Colgate head coach Mike Harder opted to pull Takacs out of his crease for an extra attacker, making it six-on-three with almost 14 minutes still left in the game.
But despite all of the offensive zone time for Colgate, it couldn’t find an answer to Shane.
“[They were] unbelievable,” Shane said about the penalty killers in front of him. “Even the [six]-on-three, when [Colgate] pulled their goalie, the guys were unbelievable in front of me –– let me see pucks, blocked a ton of shots. … They didn’t give Colgate much of a sniff.”
In all, Cornell killed four penalties in the third period. Colgate attempted 28 shots in the third period compared to Cornell’s eight, but nothing would be enough to beat Shane.
“We kind of got back to our identity that helped us win last year,” Bancroft said. “They didn’t get anything; six-on-three, they didn’t get anything. The boys put in a great effort in the third period and [it] showed on the scoreboard.”
Cornell would make it 3-0 on an unorthodox play in the final minute, when junior forward Dalton Bancroft had a breakaway on an empty net and Colgate took a too-many-men penalty, which automatically awarded a goal to Bancroft.
Schafer’s coaching career will continue next weekend as the Red head north to Herb Brooks Arena to defend it 2024 Whitelaw Cup title.
“We got something to defend going back there,” Shane said. “We’re just gonna try to make the most of it.”
Cornell’s opponent for the ECAC semifinals is to be determined as Clarkson and Harvard will play a third game to decide the final quarterfinal series. Quinnipiac and Dartmouth also earned sweeps and will join Cornell in Lake Placid.
“We know we have a winning team,” Bancroft said. “We’re just excited to get there.”
