Coming off a 3-0 loss to crosstown rival Boston University, the Harvard men’s hockey men’s team came home to the Bright Hockey Center to lick its wounds and enjoy some Thanksgiving leftovers against ECAC table scraps Union and RPI.

The Crimson (7-3-0, 7-2-0 ECAC) endured 33 penalties for 106 minutes —including three game misconducts—in its eventual 7-4 victory over the Union Dutchmen on Friday night.

Coming off that physically and emotionally charged game against Union, Harvard changed styles and embarked on a quick skating transition game that sealed a 3-1 win against RPI. The result of the different game plan was the same—a Crimson victory—even if the games themselves were markedly different.

Harvard 3, RPI 1

Harvard took over first place in the ECAC with the victory over RPI, moving two points ahead of Yale for the conference lead. Despite a strong transition attack in the game that resulted in numerous odd-man rushes, the Engineers (6-8-1, 1-4-1) fell prey to the Crimson’s potent offensive pressure.

Harvard opened up the scoring midway through the first period on a textbook play from sophomore defenseman Noah Welch to junior forward Tyler Kolarik. Sophomore center Tom Cavanagh skated into the Engineer end and passed the puck back to Welch at the blue line. Welch found Kolarik sitting on RPI goalie Nathan Marsters’ doorstep, and fired a cross-ice pass down to him. Kolarik redirected the puck into the net before Marsters had time to slide across the crease.

The Crimson added another goal—not half as pretty but still as effective—at the 18:00 mark of the first when winger Rob Flynn found the puck despite traffic in front of the net and poked it home for his first point of the season.

RPI increased the pressure on Harvard in the second period, aided by numerous Crimson infractions. Harvard was penalized for too many men on the ice on one occasion, as well as two penalties 11 seconds apart later in the second.

Those two penalties resulted in the RPI goal, as the Engineers took advantage of Harvard’s reduced numbers on the ensuing 5-on-3 power play. With the Crimson playing a triangle defense, the Engineers kept the puck in the Harvard zone for almost a minute and a half before forward Kevin Croxton directed a cross ice blue-line pass that captain Danny Eberly one-timed past Harvard goaltender Dov Grumet-Morris.

With the score 2-1, RPI continued the pressure on Harvard, keeping the game a back-and-forth affair in the second and third periods.

“I thought when it was 2-1, we had three or four real good opportunities to tie the game up,” RPI coach Dan Fridgen said. “You get a bounce here or there, and it’s a tie ball game.”

A tie was not to be for RPI, however, as Crimson center Brett Nowak capped off a five-point weekend with a goal to put Harvard out of reach at 17:24 of the third.

“They played very well defensively,” said Harvard coach Mark Mazzoleni. “We didn’t have as many quality scoring chances as we are used to. We were able to put them away in the last two minutes, so I was very pleased with that.”

Nowak’s goal came almost immediately after an odd-man rush for the Engineers was halted by a clutch save from Grumet-Morris, who stopped 20 of the 21 shots he faced.

Grumet-Morris turned the RPI break around, and forward Tim Pettit took the pick up ice and entered the Engineer end on the left side. He stopped and dropped a pass back to the trailing Nowak. In front of Nowak, sophomore winger Andrew Lederman got entangled with an RPI defender and Nowak was cleared for a shot that found its way past Marsters and that iced the game for Harvard.