Tufts goes 1-1 at home on weekend

The hockey team moved to within two points of the Amherst Lord Jeffs this weekend for the eighth and final NESCAC playoff spot after going 1-1 in its back-to-back home games against UMass-Boston and Babson College.

On Saturday night, the Jumbos dropped their tenth game of the season to Babson 5-1 after squeaking by UMass-Boston on Friday evening, 6-5.

"We have a good feeling against Amherst next weekend," sophomore forward Ken Cleary said.

"Everyone is pretty excited," senior tri-captain John Van Pelt added. "We still have a good chance to make the playoffs, and our fate is in our own hands which is a good position to be in."

On Saturday evening, the Jumbos stepped onto the ice hoping to amass their second straight win and tie things up with the Lord Jeffs in the NESCAC standings. They took a quick step towards doing so when sophomore Zak Smotherman and junior Matt McCarthy hooked up with freshman forward Matt Dalton, who fired the puck between the pipes for his first goal of the season.

Senior goalie Ben Crapser held his ground for the first 20 minutes, sending back all 13 shots to preserve the one-goal cushion, but the Tufts offense was unable to capitalize on any opportunities for the rest of the period.

"We were shooting pretty well, we outshot them overall," senior tri-captain John Van Pelt said. "The puck just didn't seem to want to bounce our way."

Crapser wasn't as lucky on the Beavers' 14th shot attempt. Just 55 seconds into the second period, Babson evened the score on a goal by senior Rob Harvey.

The score set back the Jumbos, both offensively and defensively. Despite notching thirteen shot attempts in the period, the Jumbo attack was unable to put the puck in the net. Meanwhile, the Beavers tallied two more goals at 14:41 and 17:41 by seniors Dustin Kim and Dan Snyder to give the Beavers a two-goal cushion heading into the final period.

"Our morale was very high all throughout the game," Cleary said. "Because we knew we were dominating them throughout the contest, but we just couldn't put the puck in the back of the net."

The Jumbos were unable to bounce back in the third period, especially after Babson added its fourth unanswered goal of the game just two minutes in by sophomore forward James LaFreniere to put Babson up three.

Babson added the nail in the Jumbos' coffin with 6:30 left in regulation on a shorthanded goal by senior Eric Tkacz to increase its lead to 5-1 and put the lead out of the Jumbos' reach.

"We carried the play for the most of the game," Cleary said. "They just seemed to get all the lucky breaks that turned into easy goals."

Crapser suffered the loss for the squad despite making 31 saves. After surrendering the early goal, Beavers goalie John Sterbling played 58 minutes of scoreless hockey to earn the win for Babson, knocking away 37 of 38 shot opportunities overall.

On Friday night, the Jumbos earned their third victory of the season, knocking off the UMass Boston Beacons 6-5.

Tufts took an early three goal lead over the first ten minutes of the game on goals by senior tri captain Pat Byrne, Cleary, and McCarthy. On the other end of the ice, Crapser held his ground in the first, not allowing the Beacons to put anything past him.

However, much like Saturday's contest against Babson, UMass came out fiery in the second period and amassed goals from senior Stephen Chin and junior Aaron Olsen to bring the Beacons back to within one.

McCarthy led the charge for Tufts in the second half of the period to regain a three goal cushion, first on an assist to freshman John Murphy, then on an unassisted goal of his own with four minutes left in the second. Beacon senior Michael Ciarletta took a perfect pass behind the Tufts defense to score a breakaway goal late in the second to bring the Beacons back in the game heading into the final period of play.

The Jumbos' lead would be reduced to one just 33 seconds into the period when senior Brian Sullivan scored from right in front of the net for UMass to make the score 5-4.

Cleary put the game away, however, with a shorthanded goal at 13:58 to make the score 6-4.

UMass added a goal as the final buzzer sounded, but it was too little too late as the Jumbos skated away with the 6-5 victory.

Crapser had another strong effort, making 31 saves in notching the victory.

Heading into next weekend, Tufts knows what it has to work on to be successful against the Lord Jeffs.

"The major things we need to work on are not taking penalties in the offensive zone, playing with the systems, and just all around working hard as one unit," Cleary said. "If we do those well, we'll be fine."