Junior right wing Brian Morgan scored with 5:56 left in regulation to give the University of Maine’s Black Bears a 1-1 overtime tie with Union College on Friday night at Messa Rink in Schenectady, New York.
Freshman left wing Brendan Taylor scored his first collegiate goal at the 4:27 mark of the second period to stake Union to a 1-0 lead.
Maine is 0-0-3, the first time in program history dating back to 1977-78 that the Black Bears began a season with three ties.
Union (1-0-2) had won the last four meetings between the two.
The teams play again at 7 p.m. Saturday.
Union junior goalie Alex Sakellaropoulos finished with 32 saves, and Maine freshman netminder Rob McGovern came up with 28 stops.
Morgan was able to convert an Eric Schurhamer pass with Andrew Tegeler also picking up an assist.
“Schurhamer had the puck behind the net and passed it out to me,” said Morgan. “Someone poke-checked the puck but it came back to me. I went to the side of the net, turned around and I shot it in off the goalie’s back.”
“It was a big-time battle,” said Maine coach Red Gendron. “You had two evenly-matched teams. Whenever you come back to tie a game, you always feel better than the other way around. Tonight was very positive.
“We had a stretch in the second period when we lost focus but, after that, we played a lot better. Our battle level was huge most of the night,” added Gendron.
“The guys played real well defensively and never quit,” said McGovern.
Union coach Rick Bennett said, “That is a different team than a year ago. We won those games last year because of Colin (Stevens, last year’s goalie). That’s a very good hockey team.”
McGovern was shaken up when he came out of his net to prevent a potential breakaway by Winthrop’s Mark Dufour with 2:20 left in overtime. He collided with Dufour and said it knocked the wind out of him. Trainer Paul Culina attended to him and McGovern returned to his net.
Taylor’s goal came after McGovern had made an initial save. Taylor pounced on the rebound, circled the net and scored with a wraparound.
“I thought I had made the save,” said McGovern.
Linemates Eli Lichtenwald and Tyler Hynes picked up assists.
“That line worked extremely hard and they got rewarded. It was a line of effort,” said Bennett.
Captain Steven Swavely said Maine played well and turned in a “strong defensive effort.
“But we could have had many more goals. We didn’t bury our chances,” said Swavely.
After an evenly-played, scoreless first period with few scoring chances, each team generated a number of quality chances in the second and third periods.
McGovern made a couple of important saves after Union had scored to keep the Bears within one.
Maine gained momentum on a power play midway through the middle period and had the better chances but it couldn’t solve Sakellaropoulos.