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BOSTON ––– “I wanted revenge.”
After giving up eight goals to the No. 9 Harvard men’s ice hockey team on New Year’s Day, Northeastern Huskies goaltender Devon Levi wanted another chance to beat the Crimson, only this time, on Boston’s biggest stage.
“I wanted Harvard to beat [Boston College]. I wanted to see them in the finals again. They put on a clinic against me and I wanted revenge,” Levi said.
After Monday night’s dramatic Beanpot championship victory for his No. 16 Northeastern University Huskies, revenge is exactly what he got.
In a tense, raucous, and evenly-played Beanpot title game at T.D. Garden, the Huskies emerged victorious over the Crimson with a 3-2 shootout victory, the first time in the tournament’s 70-year history that a Beanpot game had been decided in a shootout following a recent NCAA rule change.
Both teams overcame deficits on the way to overtime, backed by outstanding performances from their goaltenders. Levi, the tournament MVP, made 32 saves in regulation and overtime, narrowly outdueling senior goaltender Mitchell Gibson, who stopped 27 of 29 shots before allowing the shootout’s lone goal.
Levi shut down some of the Crimson’s best players in the shootout, stopping junior forward Sean Farrell, sophomore forward Matthew Coronato, and junior forward Alex Laferriere in the three rounds. Northeastern’s sole shootout tally was provided by Milton, Mass. native Aidan McDonough, the Huskies’ captain, and Levi’s stop of Laferriere’s shot on the next attempt won the tournament for the Huskies, sending the Northeastern banner into the T.D. Garden rafters.
“[I] want to congratulate Northeastern. I thought it was a heck of a college hockey game,” head coach Ted Donato’91 said. “Both sides probably would have agreed that it's a tough way to lose the Beanpot Championship but I think they deserve a lot of credit. I’m very proud of our guys as well.”
Harvard jumped out to a strong start after the opening puck drop. First-year forward Joe Miller fired a hard one-timer on Levi early on after a low-to-high play, but Levi gloved the puck to stop play. First-year forward Marek Hejduk, the hero of last Monday’s semifinals against Boston College, had an opportunity to knock in a rebound when he was left alone in front of the net, but he was unable to corral the loose puck. Soon after, the Huskies recorded their first dangerous chance of the game, as Gibson denied an attempted wrap-around before the Crimson defense cleared the rebound out of the crease. Harvard continued to fire pucks on Levi from all angles, but senior forward and captain John Farinacci and sophomore forward Alex Gaffney were unable to jam the puck past Levi after a particularly lively rebound. Neither team generated many high-danger chances in the second half of the first period, with both defenses and goalies tightly defending the dangerous areas of the ice, and the first frame ended in a scoreless tie.
Despite the slow start, both teams came out hot at the start of the second period. On the Huskies’ first offensive possession, forward Gunnarwolfe Fontaine received a great cross ice pass off the rush, but his shot missed wide of the net. However, Northeastern immediately regained control of the puck and after a shot from the point by forward Sam Colangelo was knocked down in front, Fontaine cleaned up the rebound in the crease to give the Huskies a 1-0 lead.
It didn’t take long for Harvard to respond in kind. Less than a minute later, senior forward Austin Wong was cross-checked into the boards in the offensive zone, earning a two-minute power play.
Harvard’s lethal power play unit, which ranked 12th in the nation with a 23.9% conversion rate entering the game, only needed 38 seconds to knot the game at 1-1. Sophomore defenseman Ian Moore, quarterbacking the top power play unit, found Farrell at the right faceoff circle, and the Hopkinton, Mass. native fired a perfect cross-ice pass to Coronato at the left circle, where the sophomore hammered a one-timer past Levi to tie the game.
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“We knew Harvard’s got a really good power play,” Northeastern head coach Jerry Keefe said. “You saw how dangerous they were because they got one on the power play…[We wanted] to make sure we weren't taking careless penalties but still playing with the motion and doing it the right way.”
The Crimson kept its offensive attack moving at even strength, and Coronato tallied his second goal of the game only six minutes after his opening strike. After senior defenseman Ryan Siedem launched a hard shot from the point, Levi made the save but failed to locate the rebound as the puck floated in the air. When it landed, Coronato, waiting on the doorstep, pounced on the loose change and lifted the puck past an out-of-position Levi and into the open net, giving Harvard a 2-1 lead roughly halfway through the game.
Shortly after Coronato’s go-ahead marker, the Huskies began to push back, and in the remainder of the period, Gibson shined. The Huskies maintained the majority of possession for the rest of the second period, keeping the puck in the offensive zone for a number of extended shifts. Fontaine had a great chance on a one-timer at point blank range, but his rocket whistled wide with five minutes to play. Northeastern also had a chance to tie the score on a chaotic scramble in the crease following a wrap-around, but senior forward and captain Baker Shore got in the way and helped save a sure goal, maintaining the 2-1 Crimson advantage heading to the final 20 minutes.
Unlike Harvard’s Beanpot semifinal contest, when Boston College tied the score with less than two minutes left in the third period, the Huskies wasted no time finding their equalizer with their tournament hopes on the line. Less than five minutes into the period, Fontaine slipped behind Shore and sophomore defenseman Kyle Aucoin in front of the net, and Northeastern defenseman Jayden Struble fed him a perfect pass that he simply tapped into the yawning net, evening the score at 2-2.
“They were just two great plays by two teammates of mine, Jayden Struble and Sam Colangelo,” said Fontaine regarding his two goals. “They set me up in front and I was lucky to get some empty netters there.”
For the final 15 minutes of action, both goaltenders put on a clinic, making numerous highlight-reel saves to keep their squads in the game. With only 10 minutes to play in regulation, senior defenseman and captain Henry Thrun, returning from a one-game injury absence, made a great move to create space at the blue line, but Levi denied both his long-range shot and a rebound attempt by Drkulec at close range. Only two minutes later, a careless play by the Huskies’ defense left Miller alone with the puck rolling towards Levi, but the Quebec native made a brilliant poke check to disrupt Miller’s chance.
Gibson made two brilliant saves on the next shift, denying both forward Justin Hryckowian’s one-timer and forward Matt Choupani’s stuff-in attempt on the rebound. The Crimson hit two posts in the waning minutes of regulation, with both Coronato and sophomore forward Alex Gaffney coming inches away from giving Harvard a late lead, and after Northeastern couldn’t capitalize on an offensive zone faceoff with 15 seconds to play, the Beanpot championship game headed to a five minute 3-on-3 overtime period for the first time in its illustrious history.
While Levi stole the show in the third period with 14 saves, Gibson put on a show of his own in sudden-death overtime, keeping Harvard’s title hopes alive. After Farrell turned the puck over in the offensive zone, Huskies defenseman Vinny Borgesi skated in all alone with a chance to win the Beanpot title, but the Pennsylvanian flashed the leather to shut down the breakaway with a glove save. After making back-to-back saves on Fontaine and Colangelo, Gibson stopped another breakaway, squeezing his legs together to stop Hryckowian after he split the defense at the Crimson’s defensive blueline. In the final seconds of the extra session, Coronato had a golden chance from the slot to win the championship, but Levi’s big left pad denied his wrister as time expired, sending the Beanpot title showdown to its first-ever decisive shootout.
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“I think both [Gibson and Levi] made it look fairly easy at times. There's a lot of stress, [with] one goal [scored] for the last 15 minutes and in the five minute overtime,” Donato said. “I thought [Gibson] played great and obviously Levi’s a tremendous goalie and he made some big saves as well.”
With the tension at T.D. Garden running high and the boisterous crowd on its feet, Farrell and Northeastern forward Jack Hughes each failed to score in the opening round of the shootout. However, after Levi denied Coronato’s attempt to open the second round, McDonough skated in on Gibson with speed and roofed a wrist shot to put the Huskies one save away from Beanpot glory.
Junior forward Alex Laferriere shot third for Harvard, but Levi was equal to the task again, turning aside Laferriere’s attempt to secure the Beanpot title. As the Huskies and their fans celebrated the program’s fourth Beanpot win in the past five tournaments, a crestfallen Harvard team waited on the ice for the customary postgame handshakes and trophy presentation before returning to the locker room.
“For the last four years, to go to battle every day with my best friends and to have the best coaching staff and the best support staff in the country in my opinion, it means everything,” said McDonough, the Milton, Mass. local. “I told the guys before the game: in the Beanpot it doesn't matter who's on whose team, it comes down to whoever wants it more.”
Despite the heartbreaking defeat, Donato believes that the loss can be a stepping stone for the Crimson as it gears up for the final regular season push, the ECAC tournament, and potentially the NCAA tourney.
“I think it's an incredible opportunity to play in that environment,” Donato said. “I think your whole team grows up to a certain point and I think, once the hurt wears down a little bit, I think it's pretty obvious that we as a group elevated our game…if we want to have success at the end of the year, we're going to have to play in tough environments and play in high stress situations, and I think we’ll look back at this as a real growing opportunity.”
The Crimson return to home ice at Bright-Landry Hockey Center this weekend for a doubleheader against ECAC opponents Union College, 7:00 pm on Friday, and then Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute at 7:00 pm on Saturday.
— Staff writer Bridget T. Sands can be reached at bridget.sands@thecrimson.com
— Staff writer Aaron B. Shuchman can be reached at aaron.shuchman@thecrimson.com
