Junior Greg O'Connell scored his fourth goal of the season 12:15 into Tuesday's game against UMass-Dartmouth to give the Jumbos an early 1-0 lead, marking the fifth time in seven games this season that Tufts has struck first.
But when Corsair sophomore Nick Paquin found the back of the net 45 minutes later, the Jumbos had seen that lead slip away once again. Paquin's goal was the final of the five allowed in the third period, as the Jumbos fell 7-2 to 11th-ranked UMass-Dartmouth. Weak passing and non-physical play led to an abundance of turnovers and several of the Corsairs' goals. The end result was an embarrassing loss - the team's third straight - that dropped the Jumbos to 2-5.
"They ran us out of the rink, plain and simple," coach Brian Murphy said. "We made awful mistakes with the puck. We got outworked, quite frankly. We expected to have a better performance. About four of our guys played hockey last night. The rest just went out for a skate."
On account of ejections resulting from a late fight against St. Anselm on Saturday, the Jumbos skated without sophomore Joe Milo and senior co-captain John Murphy on Tuesday night. With O'Connell's goal, on assists from senior Brian Bailey and junior Ross Gimbel, Tufts entered the first intermission leading 1-0 despite taking two penalties in the first period.
In the second, UMass-Dartmouth converted on two of three power play opportunities, as junior Jeff Grant and senior forward Kyle McCullough each scored to give the Corsairs a 2-1 lead at the second intermission. In the third, the game overwhelmingly broke open in just seconds - six of them to be exact.
In the opening six seconds of the third period, UMass-Dartmouth junior Jeff Grant won the faceoff at center ice, quickly caught a pass from senior teammate Jim Foley, and launched a wrist shot past Tufts goaltender Issa Azat to give his team a 3-1 lead. The game would go only downhill for the Jumbos from there, as senior Ray Kirby added the Corsairs' fourth goal at 3:57, and McCullough, sophomore Chris Shore and Paquin each added a goal to seal a 7-2 non-conference win for an undefeated UMass-Dartmouth. Amidst the chaos, Gimbel scored his fourth goal of the season for Tufts and junior Issa Azat made 37 saves in goal.
"It was a lack of effort last night - nothing else," Gimbel said.
While the team played without arguably two of its best in Milo and Murphy, Murphy and his players do not see the absence of the two as an excuse.
"Missing those guys definitely hurt us, but we also need to be able to win without them in the lineup," Gimbel added. "Specifically, we need to work on making more precise and crisp passes in the defensive zone to break out."
"We have to not turn the puck over," Murphy said. "We turned it over twice yesterday, and that definitely hurt us. We also need to be a little more physical in front of the net."
After two consecutive losses last weekend, Murphy chose to replace junior James Kalec in net with junior Issa Azat. Despite allowing seven goals, Azat stopped a total of 37 shots, including 15 consecutive saves in the first period, and Murphy refused to pin the loss on his netminder.
"Issa played very well," he said. "He gave us a chance to win, but we couldn't get it done."
If one positive thing could be taken from the game, it would be that Tufts took a relatively small number of penalties. Throughout the opening weeks of the season, the team's coaches have been grappling with the tightening of NCAA refereeing. While the Jumbos allowed two power play goals against the Corsairs, they took just seven penalties, exercising the discipline Murphy has preached for the greater part of this season.
"You're going to end up taking six or seven penalties a game with the way it's being called," Murphy said. "We're getting a little more disciplined. We have to play accordingly."
On Saturday night, Tufts will travel to Conn. College and look to rebound in its final game of the semester. The Camels currently sit in sixth place in the NESCAC with a 2-2 conference record and a 2-4 overall record.
