Somehow, it all turned out all right. Despite mustering just a tie against Vermont and an overtime loss to Dartmouth, the No. 11 Harvard men’s hockey team, traveling for its final two regular-season games, managed to secure second place in the ECAC.

Now, after 12 contests in 30 days, the Crimson (18-8-3, 15-5-2 ECAC) can finally look forward to 12 straight days of rest.

“I think we’re all going to go to Bermuda for the first week,” joked Harvard coach Ted Donato ’91, who deemed his team’s league finish, second only to Cornell, the No. 2 squad in the country, “quite an accomplishment.”

It was thanks in large part to No. 13 Colgate, really, which entered the weekend a point behind Harvard in the ECAC standings but managed only a tie and a loss itself.

This luck somewhat eased the sting of a heartbreaking Friday overtime loss in the Big Green’s Thompson Arena, and it made Saturday’s skin-of-the-teeth tie to the Catamounts (19-11-4, 13-6-3) crucial.

“Sometimes the effort’s there, and you don’t come out on top,” said Crimson captain Noah Welch after the 2-2 knot with Vermont, “but you can’t really be disappointed.”

“I’m really proud of the team right now, [and] how we responded tonight,” he added. “[The 2-1 loss to the Big Green], I’m still a little sore about that, but we still finished second, which is great, and we’ve got the bye, which is huge, too.”

HARVARD 2, VERMONT 2

BURLINGTON, Vt.—Harvard had never held a lead against Dartmouth the night before, so the Crimson wasted little time Saturday, notching a power-play goal just 4:26 into the first period.

Welch, who handled the puck on the left side of the ice, dished it to the right circle and a waiting Charlie Johnson, whose quick shot beat Catamount goaltender Joe Fallon glove-side.

It was a quick strike, and vital after 58:46 of scoreless Harvard play the previous night, but it wouldn’t prove decisive.

Vermont struck with the man advantage just over 10 minutes later, when assistant captain Scott Mifsud—the Catamounts’ Hobey Baker candidate—tipped a blast from the point top-shelf on goaltender Dov Grumet-Morris, the Crimson’s own Hobey Baker hopeful.

With 43 points to his name entering the game, Mifsud was nothing of a secret to Harvard, but the Crimson remained unable to stymie the senior winger all the same.

Mifsud notched his second power-play goal of the night 1:05 into the final frame, canceling out a second-period Brendan Bernakevitch tally and leveling the game to 2-2 for good.

“The kid Mifsud was all over our scouting report,” Welch said. “He had 10 power-play goals coming into tonight, and he got two more, which is kind of disappointing.”