The Oswego State men’s ice hockey team trailed throughout much of the contest, but scored two third period goals to come away with the 5-4 win over Utica at the Utica Memorial Auditorium on Tuesday night. Justin Fox (Jr., Whitby, Ont.and pictured) tallied the game-winning goal at 9:53 in the third period, as the top-ranked Lakers improved to 11-1-0 overall. The Pioneers fell to 4-6-2 overall on the season.
Sean McKevitt put Utica on the board in the first five minutes when he carried up the puck on a 2-1 breakaway when his shot beat Kyle Gunn-Taylor’s (Sr., West Seneca, N.Y) glove for the 1-0 lead. The Pioneers added their second score when Tim Coffman’s point-blank was steered away by Gunn-Taylor, but the rebound went right on the stick of Vincent Nucci, who was trailing the play, at the 8:20 mark.
Oswego State cut the deficit in half when Hank Van Boxmeer (So., Orange, Calif.) threw a wrist shot from the center of the blue line on net, only to be deflected in by Luke Moodie (Fr., Burlington, Ont.) for his sixth goal of the season at 10:37. Jon Whitelaw (Fr., Huntsville, Ont.) also earned an assist on the goal. The Lakers evened the contest at 2-2 when Tyler Lyon (Sr., Foxboro, Ont.) made Utica pay for a hooking penalty as his blast from the right point went top shelf above Luckow’s glove. Oswego State had a golden opportunity to go ahead late in the period as it had two-skater advantage for two minutes, but came up empty as the teams went into the first intermission knotted at 2-2.
At the start of the second stanza, Brad Dormiedy (Sr., Ajax, Ont.) threw the puck in front of the net, where Eric Selleck (So., Spencerville, Ont.) picked it up as he was crashing the net. Selleck shot the puck into the back of the open net as Luckow was caught out of position for the Lakers’ first lead of the game.
Utica tied the game with a power-play goal of its own after an Oswego State interference penalty at 9:50 when Eric Peterson snuck the puck between Gunn-Taylor’s left leg and the post. A Laker turnover at center ice allowed 16 to shoot at the net uncontested. After making multiple saves, Gunn-Taylor was unable to corral in the loose puck resulting in a goal by Tim Coffman to give the Pioneers a 4-3 lead, which was where the score stood after two frames.
Oswego State tied the game once again when Utica turned the puck over in its own zone right onto the stick of Eric Selleck. He flipped the puck under the crossbar for his second goal of the game with 15:27 remaining in regulation. Justin Fox regained the lead for the Lakers when he beat a Pioneer defenseman to a loose puck at the front of the Utica net for his seventh goal of the season. Luckow came out of the net with 1:16 to play, but Utica was unable to come up with the tying score as Oswego State escaped with the big 5-4 road win.
In net, Gunn-Taylor stopped 16 of the 20 shots he faced as he improved to 8-0-0 on the season. Anthony Luckow registered 31 saves in goal for the Pioneers.
The Lakers will travel to Hamilton College on Friday for a 7 p.m. face-off before closing out the 2009 portion of the schedule at home against Hobart on Saturday.
Courtesy of Oswego State Sports Information Department
Photo Courtesy of Oswego State Athletics