ORONO, Maine — Sophomore right wing Brian Morgan’s goal just 53 seconds into overtime gave the University of Maine men’s hockey team a wild 6-5 victory over the University of Massachusetts at Alfond Arena Friday night.
Maine squandered 3-0 and 5-3 leads but won its Hockey East opener courtesy of a four-on-two rush.
Conor Riley skated into the offensive zone and slid it to Devin Shore, who was maneuvering down the slot.
Shore found Morgan alone in the right faceoff circle and Morgan one-timed a blast that broke through UMass goalie Henry Dill and into the net.
“Devin has such good vision. I just opened up [to shoot] and he found me,” said Morgan. “I think the shot may have hit [Dill] in the best and dropped down between his legs.”
Morgan called it the “most exciting moment” of his career.
It was his first goal of the season and came on his game-high eighth shot on goal.
“Sometimes I pass up too many shots [to make a pass],” said Morgan.
“Brian had a terrific game,” said Maine coach Red Gendron. “He made the play when we needed it.”
Maine is now 2-4-1 overall while UMass fell to 2-4 overall, 1-3 in Hockey East. The two teams play again at 7 p.m. Saturday.
They entered the game as two of the nation’s lowest-scoring teams as Maine averaged just 1.83 goals per game, 44th among 59 Division 1 teams, while UMass was 34th (2.40 gpg).
Shore’s wraparound goal with 20.2 seconds left in the middle period snapped a flurry of three unanswered goals by UMass to enable the Black Bears to take a 4-3 lead into the second intermission.
Steven Swavely expanded the lead in the third period by jamming home a Liam Pecararo rebound from the edge of the crease.
But the gritty Minutemen tied it when a wide open Patrick Lee beat Maine goalie Matt Morris over the glove from the low slot after being set up by Troy Power and Dennis Kravchenko and Mike Busillo scored with a rising slap shot over Morris’ glove from the top of the left circle off a diagonal pass from Lee that bounced over two sticks to get to him.
The Black Bears received first-period goals from Malcolm Hayes and Cam Brown and Swavely’s early second-period goal made it 3-0.
But the Minutemen stunned the Bears by scoring three times in a span of 8:32 to draw even.
Freshman center Kravchenko collected his first two college goals before Ray Pigozzi equalized.
The first-period goals gave the Black Bears their first two-goal lead of the season.
Hayes scored his second power-play goal in as many games and Brown expanded the lead with his team-leading fourth of the season 7:29 later.
Hayes’ goal was set up by Brian Morgan, who carried the puck down down the slot and snapped a 25-footer that Dill kicked into the path of the oncoming Hayes.
Hayes took a stride and wristed the puck into the short-side corner before Dill could scramble across.
Brown also scored on a rebound.
Jack Musil fed a puck from the side of the net to Ben Hutton at the midpoint and he fired a 40-footer that Dill spilled out to the middle of the right circle, where Brown controlled it with his skates and kicked it to his stick before firing it into the short side corner.
Swavely scored 1:19 into the second period.
He had his back to the net but spun around and swept a loose puck past Dill.
Kravchenko scored again after some crafty work behind the net.
He possessed the puck and tried a wrap-around that deflected off Morris and glanced in off a Maine defenseman.
Pigozzi knotted it up at the 15:07 mark when the Minutemen generated a two-on-oh rush and he converted a nice pass across the goalmouth by Frank Vatrano.
Swavely and Morgan said despite squandering leads, they remained positive on the bench entering overtime.
Maine kept the puck in UMass’ zone much longer than the Minutemen but UMass was potent in transition especially when Maine turned the puck over.
“We played very well offensively,” said Gendron. “Everyone worked their tails off. UMass is young like we are but they are a very talented team and when they get a chance, they put it in.”
Gendron added that he liked the way his team responded after giving up Busillo’s tying goal.
But he also said his team’s puck management and defensive positioning wasn’t what it should have been at times.
UMass coach John Micheletto said his team didn’t play the way it needed to in order to win.
“There were a handful of positives that were wiped out by too many negatives,” said Micheletto. “We were on the perimeter too much. If you’re going to win in this league, you have to get inside.”