MINNEAPOLIS—In his first pair of starts for the Harvard men’s hockey team, sophomore goaltender Justin Tobe let only three pucks slip past his pads. Factor in one more game, a contest against Merrimack in the consolation round of the Dodge Holiday Classic Dec. 23, and Tobe’s goals-against average has more than doubled.

The Northville, Mich., native and Crimson transfer let in six Warrior goals en route to a 6-4 loss, marking a not-so-happy return to the Midwest for the goaltender who played one year for Michigan State and another for the USHL’s Danville Wings before joining Harvard (9-4-2, 6-3-1 ECAC).

“Usually, when you score four goals, you should win the game,” Tobe admitted, “so a lot of that falls on the goalie.”

Merrimack (7-11-2, 1-8-1 Hockey East) converted on four of its five power-play opportunities, employing strong screens and eluding, for the most part, Harvard’s defensive efforts.

After the third Warrior goal found the back of the net at 18:41 in the second period, giving Merrimack a two-goal lead, Crimson blueliner Dylan Reese angrily batted the puck back towards center ice. The Warriors had taken just three shots in that middle frame and scored twice.

“I didn’t think they were getting a ton of opportunities,” said Harvard coach Ted Donato ’91, “but it did seem that when they did, they cashed in on them.”

Donato left Tobe in for the third period, choosing not to substitute in his usual starter, senior Dov Grumet-Morris, and the Warriors would strike three times more, the first goal just 1:29 into the final frame, a shot top-shelf that drew a late reaction from Tobe.

Just over eight minutes later, Merrimack’s Brian Schmidt would notch the eventual game-winner, all the more back-breaking because Schmidt was just seven seconds out of the penalty box—an all-but-shorthanded goal for the Warriors.

“I could stay here and second-guess myself all night,” Tobe said after the game. “It’s not going to do much good.”

UNDER THE WEATHER

Apparently not enough of the 33 shots the Crimson managed in its 0-0 tie against Northern Michigan (9-5-4, 7-3-2 CCHA) were flu shots.

Ravaged en masse by what Donato labeled “a nasal infection,” Harvard’s skaters were noticeably a step slower than usual, struggling to crash the net and generate traffic just beyond the Wildcats’ netminder Tuomas Tarkki’s crease. Soft rebounds left on Tarkki’s doorstep that would otherwise have been pounced upon and poked home were regularly corralled by Northern Michigan’s blueliners and cleared from harm’s way with minimal challenge from the Crimson’s forwards.

“Some of our top guys that are usually going at top speed,” Donato said, “were a little below that.”

Harvard’s collective health began to deteriorate last week in the wake of its victory over then-No. 10 Maine. Prohibitively shorthanded by the rash of illnesses, Donato ended practice early on Dec. 15, and estimated yesterday that 80 percent of his active roster was still hindered by antibiotics.

“From an energy standpoint, I don’t think we were in top form,” Donato said. “We’ve had a tough week of practice with having 14, 15 guys out all week sick, and it looked it.”