ESTERO, Fla. — It wasn’t the way the University of Maine Black Bears wanted to reach the championship game of the 10th annual Florida College Classic.
But they’ll take it.
Junior defenseman and assistant captain Jeff Dimmen scored the game-winning goal in the shootout after Maine and Princeton University had skated to a wild 6-6 overtime tie Tuesday night.
A shootout was used to determine which team would play in the championship game and the Black Bears triumphed 3-2.
The Maine men’s hockey team had its five-game winning streak snapped but extended its unbeaten streak to seven games. Maine is now 9-7-2 overall.
Princeton is 4-8-2.
Maine will play 12-4-3 Colorado College, the nation’s third-ranked team, in tonight’s 7:35 title game while Princeton will face 7-3-2 Cornell, the nation’s No. 4 team, in the 4:05 p.m. consolation game.
Colorado College beat Cornell 4-2 in Tuesday night’s second game.
Dimmen was Maine’s fifth and final shooter and snapped the 2-2 tie.
“There’s always some pressure but you’ve got to block it out and have fun. I tried to keep myself calm and I went with my bread-and-butter [move],” said Dimmen.
“I came in, faked a shot low blocker side, moved the puck a little bit and put it five-hole,” said Dimmen who beat Princeton senior goalie and 2008-2009 Hobey Baker Award finalist Zane Kalemba.
“I wasn’t worried about Jeff with the way he scores goals in practice,” said Maine sophomore goalie Scott Darling. “He can score goals. He made a real nice move.”
Robby Dee and Brian Flynn scored the other shootout goals for Maine while Matt Arhontas and Mike Kramer converted for Princeton.
The game will be recorded as a tie and that left a bitter taste in the mouths of the Black Bears because they squandered 4-1 and 6-4 leads.
“It was bittersweet,” said Dimmen. “It’s always good to get into the championship game but we felt we gave one away in regulation.”
“Obviously, we aren’t happy about it but you’ve got to give Princeton a lot of credit,” said junior center Dee, who had a pair of goals after missing two games with a shoulder injury. “We gave up way too many shots on Scotty [Maine goalie Scott Darling]. We had way too many defensive breakdowns. They were getting second and third chances.”
First-period goals by Adam Shemansky, Dee and Josh Van Dyk offset one by Princeton’s Taylor Fedun to give Maine a 3-1 lead after 20 minutes.
The goals by Shemansky, Dee and Fedun came on the power play.
Gustav Nyquist’s power-play goal 1:29 into the second period made it 4-1 but 2:34 later, Maine junior center and captain Tanner House was assessed a five-minute major for contact-to-the-head roughing and the Tigers scored three times with Portland’s Dan Bartlett making it 4-2 and Mark Magnowski notching the next two 1:16 apart.
Sophomore left wing Theo Andersson regained the lead for Maine at the 15:48 mark and Dee’s early third-period goal made it 6-4.
Kevin Lohry sliced the lead to 6-5 at the 11:45 mark and Arhontas tied it up 1:44 later.
Dee had an assist to go with his two goals and Nyquist had two assists to go with his goal. Van Dyk had an assist along with his first career collegiate goal and Kevin Swallow and Klas Leidermark had two assists apiece.
Magnowski had two assists to accompany his two goals; Fedun had two assists along with his goal, Bartlett had an assist and a goal. Mike Kramer had three assists and Jody Pederson and a pair.
Darling had allowed just one goal in each of his previous five starts, and finished with 35 saves while Kalemba wound up with 29.
“It was kind of a weird game,” said Darling. “I didn’t have my best night. I had an average night and it shows in the score.”
Arhontas’ tying goal came off the deflection of a point shot, according to Darling.
“It was a shot through traffic and he tipped it through my five-hole,” said Darling.
Princeton went 4-for-8 on the power play while Maine went 3-for-6 and is now 14-for-28 with the man advantage in its last five games.
“We didn’t do a very good job on the penalty kill,” said Dimmen. “Scotty didn’t see the first shot and then they’d get two more after that. We’ve got to tighten up, block shots and clear rebounds.”
They are looking forward to tonight’s challenge.
“This will be a great chance for us to prove ourselves against a top five team,” said Dee.
“It’ll be a huge test. I haven’t played in a championship game for as long as I can remember … since I was a kid. I’m excited,” said Darling.