“After the second goal, when they got a bounce, we couldn’t mount much of an attack,” Donato said. “We played a semblance of our game in the first period.”

Though Harvard managed 11 shots on goal in the second frame, most came from beyond the faceoff circles and hardly fazed the Northeastern goaltender.

But the Crimson had plenty of action in their own defensive zone.

Just nine minutes after the first score of the period, Northeastern senior Wade MacLeod found fellow senior Steve Silva in the slot, who powered the puck past the Harvard goalie to take a three-goal lead.

To cap the scoring rampage, the Huskies capitalized on a 5-on-3 advantage. After two Crimson players received interference penalties, the Northeastern front line moved the puck with ease before freshman Brodie Reid scored the third and final goal of the period from the right faceoff circle.

In the final frame, Harvard replaced the struggling Carroll with senior Kyle Richter, who started between the pipes at the beginning of the season. Richter helped keep the Huskies scoreless in the third frame, but by that time the match was already out of reach.

With the defeat, Harvard has now dropped 17 of its last 19 contests.

Both the players and the coach were unsatisfied with the team’s performance.

“We didn’t play a full 60 minutes,” Huxley said. “It’s hard to win a hockey game when you don’t play hard.”

“I don’t feel like we came out with the same passion that we’ve been playing with,” Donato echoed.

In addition to what the team saw as a lack of determination, offensive struggles plagued the Crimson as well. But that’s nothing new for the men from Cambridge, having scored two or less goals in eight of their last nine games.

“We just didn’t create enough traffic and enough scoring opportunities in front of the goal,” Donato said.

After the discouraging loss, it won’t get any easier next week, when Harvard will face an even tougher opponent in No.14 Boston University in the consolation match.

To keep that game competitive, Harvard has a lot of work to do.

“We just [have to] get back to the tape and see what we did wrong, learn from our mistakes, and try not to make them again,” Huxley said.