After scoring just his first goal of the season in the second period of a 4-2 loss to Maine on Dec. 15, Turano broke his right ring finger later in the game and was to forced to go under the knife to repair the damage. Turano is expected to return in time of the Beanpot in February.
Hafner, who had already missed seven games after spraining his MCL on Nov. 9 against Vermont, reinjured the same knee in the Maine game.
“I got hit along the boards and aggravated it,” Hafner said. “It feels great now, and I’m pretty much back to 100 percent. I’ll be wearing a brace when I come back, but we have a bunch of guys on the team right now wearing braces.”
Despite the manpower crisis on the team, Hafner did not rush his return.
“Neither I nor any of the coaches or trainers wanted to rush it,” Hafner said.
Hafner missed two games before returning to the lineup Saturday. His return to the top defensive pairing with sophomore Noah Welch allowed coach Mark Mazzoleni to shift junior defensemen Blair Barlow to left wing on the fourth line.
Bernakevitch, who sustained a lower-body injury against Northern Michigan on Dec. 29, is doubtful for this weekend but should return after the break.
Alma Mater Matters
Saturday night’s game at Union was originally scheduled for Feb. 8, to coincide with the Crimson’s Feb. 7 meeting with RPI, just a couple of miles down in the road in Troy, N.Y.
With the Beanpot final scheduled for Feb. 10, the original schedule would have forced Harvard to play three games in four nights heading into what has the potential to be the most important game of the regular season for the Crimson.
Although a Beanpot win will not help Harvard in the standings, it would be hard to find a Crimson player who would not trade two points for a Beanpot title.
Harvard has not won the Beanpot since 1993. Although the schedule change certainly helps Harvard, it might have hurt Union. With the original schedule, the Dutchmen would have faced a very different Crimson team on Feb. 8 than they had to play Saturday night.
With three games in four nights and the Beanpot final two days away, Mazzoleni likely would have rested star sophomore goaltender Dov Grumet-Morris in favor of freshmen John Daigneau. That could have been the difference in the game, as Union coach Kevin Sneddon ’92 should have realized before agreeing to the change and probably realized after the game.
“He played great tonight,” Sneddon said. “Grumet-Morris was the MVP of the game in my opinion.”
Sneddon captained the Crimson his senior season and won both a Beanpot title with Harvard during his freshman season in 1989.
According to Sneddon, he agreed to the schedule change to help showcase the ECAC in a high profile tournament like the Beanpot.
“We have to do what is best for the league,” Sneddon said. “We want to make sure that, in a tournament like that, our team [Harvard] isn’t tired out there against another team that’s rested. We’re glad to help the league out and help Harvard out.”
For Union’s sake, let’s just hope that helping out Harvard and the league did not cost his own team two points.
— Staff writer Timothy Jackson can be reached at jackson2@fas.harvard.edu