It was the same old story for the University of Maine men’s hockey team Friday night.
The Black Bears, the nation’s 10th-most penalized team, continued to be hurt by penalties. The University of New Hampshire capitalized with a pair of second-period power-play goals off the stick of senior right wing Tyler Kelleher and the Black Bears saw their futility on the road extend to 15 games (0-12-3) as UNH cruised to a 5-1 triumph at the Whittemore Center.
UNH expanded its unbeaten streak against UMaine to five games (4-0-1) and improved to 7-6-2 on the season, 4-1-1 in Hockey East.
UMaine fell to 5-8-3 and 1-5-1, respectively.
The two teams will play again 7:30 p.m. Saturday at the Alfond Arena in Orono.
UNH junior goalie Danny Tirone finished with 23 saves, and UMaine’s Rob McGovern made 21 saves and allowed four goals before being replaced by Matt Morris, who made two saves on three shots.
Freshman left wing Mitch Fossier snapped a nine-game goalless drought in the first period as he scored on the power play, but Kelleher tied it at the 6:23 mark of the second period and gave UNH the lead for good 8:31 later.
Freshman Brendan van Riemsdyk, the third van Riemsdyk brother to play at UNH after National Hockey League brothers James (Toronto) and Trevor (Chicago), supplied the Wildcats with an insurance goal 2:42 into the third period, and Jason Salvaggio made it 4-1 at the 14:18 mark.
McGovern, who was shaken up earlier in the period when a shot hit him below his mask, was replaced by Morris, and Cameron Marks greeted Morris by beating him from the top of the right circle 1:07 later.
UMaine has been held to two goals or less nine times this season.
Fossier had opened the scoring when his centering pass intended for Cedric Lacroix deflected off the skate of UNH defenseman Matias Cleland and behind Tirone.
Kelleher, who entered the game as the nation’s fourth-leading scorer with 24 points in 14 games, tied it up by skating across the top of the slot and beating McGovern with a deflected wrist shot.
The goal that proved to be the game-winner came off a scintillating rush down the left wing by the swift-skating Kelleher.
He put on a burst of speed to bust after picking the puck up in the neutral zone, skated past three Black Bears with defenseman Sam Becker being the last of the three, and then cut across the low slot before tucking the puck inside the far post after he averted a McGovern poke-check.
“The bottom line was we went from playing well and staying out of the box (in the first period) to taking some penalties in the second period including a silly (10-minute) misconduct penalty (on senior defenseman and assistant captain Eric Schurhamer). That didn’t help us,” said UMaine coach Red Gendron. “That was that.”
UMaine gave the Wildcats four power plays in the middle period after taking just one penalty in the first period.
“The first period was one of our better periods other than some breakdowns. But the penalties definitely hurt us in the second period,” said Maine senior center and captain Cam Brown.
Van Riemsdyk scored with a tip-in off a point shot from Marks after McGovern had lost his stick and was trying to retrieve it.
Salvaggio put the game away after Kelleher had made a nifty move to try to get around UMaine defenseman Mark Hamilton. McGovern poke-checked the loose puck, but it landed on Salvaggio’s stick and he roofed it from the low slot.
Kelleher had an assist to go with his two goals and now has three goals and 13 assists in his career against the Black Bears. Cleland wound up with two assists.
UNH, which had the game’s 15th best power play entering the game at a 20.2 percent efficiency rate, went 2-for-5 with the man advantage while UMaine had just two power play chances and converted on one.
UMaine is 3-for-7 with the man-advantage over the past two games.