The Crimson performed strongly against Brown’s drop-style defense—the same technique Princeton used last weekend to stifle Harvard’s offense. The Crimson spent a significant amount of practice time this week working on defeating the scheme in anticipation of other teams’ attempts to copy it.

“This week we had a drill where we did the exact same drop, a four drop,” Bermeister said. “We worked on driving the point and keeping the offense in motion. It worked pretty well; we scored a lot tonight.”

Midway through the third period, still down four goals, Brown mounted a comeback effort, scoring three goals in quick succession—closing the gap to 7-6.

“It was a little mental lapse and we were tired,” Ludwick said. “We had a lead on them but we hadn’t quite put them away so we just lost a bit of focus.”

Knowing the game was still within reach, the Crimson stopped the Bears’ charge and held the one goal lead. Ludwick then whipped a shot into the top right corner of the net to put the Crimson ahead by two.

“The second goal, the goalie just wasn’t paying attention and I took advantage,” Ludwick said.

With renewed purpose, the Crimson scored three of the next four goals to extend its lead to four. Senior driver Mike Masterson tucked two goals into the lower corners of the net, and junior Todd Schulte’s laser as the shot clock expired sealed the Harvard victory.

The Crimson heads to the West Coast this weekend looking to build on its three game winning streak.

—Contributing writer Timothy J. McGinn can be reached at mcginn@fas.harvard.edu