Senior center Harry Schwefel left a drop pass for sophomore winger Brett Nowak at the blueline. Unattended, Nowak stickhandled the puck to the center of the right circle and fired a soft shot past rookie netminder Nathan Marsters to hit the twine at 3:31.

The heart-breaker for the down-trodden Engineers came at 13:46 in the final frame. Killing off a 5-on-3 disadvantage, R.P.I. center Jim Henkel nabbed the puck in the neutral zone and flew in on a short-handed breakaway. Henkel had Jonas down and beaten, but Jonas used his cat-like reflexes to rob Henkel of R.P.I.'s best scoring opportunity all night.

"It was like Dominic Hasek," Mazzoleni said. "And it's not the first time he's made that type of a save for us. It's a compliment to him because he doesn't quit on the play. He knew he was down and out, but he continued to battle."

Looking at the big picture, the Crimson's discouraging defeat on Saturday does little to affect the overall conference positions. Harvard shook Dartmouth off its back and moved into a tie for third place with Cornell, leaving the Big Green alone in fifth place.

However, it wasn't so much the Crimson's split last weekend that moved Harvard into the third slot. Rather, the Crimson owe their ranking to the remarkable parity among the remaining 11 teams vying for playoff spots. As this weekend demonstrated, just about every team in this league is capable of beating every other squad in the conference.

Friday night witnessed six hotly contested matchups, with every ECAC team battling to a one-goal game or a tie. Saturday's games were a bit more wide open, but featured a handful of key upsets and victories. While Union toppled Harvard, Princeton defeated a fledgling Vermont squad and an inconsistent Yale squad moved in to sixth place by ringing up the Big Green 6-3.

The most important game for the Crimson was the marquee matchup between Clarkson and Cornell. A surgling Clarkson squad kept pace with St. Lawrence at the top of the pack by downing Cornell 2-0. The Big Red suffered a sweep at the hands of the North Country duo, allowing Harvard to move within striking distance.

Thanks to these results, Harvard has not surprisingly guaranteed itself a spot in post-season play. With only two regular seasons left in the season, it is impossible for the ECAC's bottom three squads--Union, Vermont, and Colgate--to surpass the Crimson's 23 points.