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| MICH |
Cristoval Nieves (6) Piazza (4), Kile (12) |
3 | 2:19 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
MICH
Justin Selman (8)
Calderone (9), Warren (10)
3
10:50
MICH
Tyler Motte (21)
Compher (27), Connor (22)
3
14:45
MICH
Tyler Motte (22) -- ENG/PPG
Unassisted
3
18:05
|
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Jan. 30, 2016
NEW YORK -- The No. 15 Penn State men's hockey team was unable to fend off No. 6 Michigan as the Wolverines won 6-3 in comeback fashion in front of 13,479 fans at Madison Square Garden on Saturday night. Three Nittany Lions scored in the victory as Eamon McAdam (Perkasie, Pa.) made a career-high 43 saves and added an assist.
"I thought it was a tremendous event," said head coach Guy Gadowsky of the Super Saturday showcase at Madison Square Garden. "I think Penn Staters had a tremendous time. I felt really good about the first two periods, but we weren't able to finish it off."
David Goodwin (Des Peres, Mo.), Andrew Sturtz (Buffalo, N.Y.) and Ricky DeRosa (Aston, Pa.) all tallied goals for Penn State (16-7-3, 6-4-0-0 Big Ten), while Vince Pedrie (Rochester, Minn.) chipped in with two assists for his first career multi-point game.
Penn State had to use a comeback of its own in the second period after JT Compher scored a short-handed goal for a 2-1 lead after 15 seconds. The Michigan lead would be short lived, however, as the Nittany Lions struck for their first power-play goal in two weeks.
Michigan (16-3-4, 7-1-2-1 Big Ten) cleared the zone with 20 seconds to play and made a line change as McAdam quickly played the puck to a waiting Pedrie at Michigan's blue line to create a 3-on-1 opportunity. Pedrie carried the puck into the zone and found Sturtz on the left wing as the freshman wristed a puck through Steve Racine (33 saves) to even the score with two seconds remaining on the man-advantage.
The goal was Sturtz's team-leading 13th of the year, which puts him one behind second place on the Penn State freshman scoring list (14, Casey Bailey, 2012-13). McAdam picked up his second assist in his past three outings becoming the first Nittany Lion netminder to record more than one point in a single season. McAdam has all three Penn State goalie points in program history.
Penn State took its first lead of the weekend when DeRosa slammed home his fifth of the year almost four minutes later. A good shift by DeRosa's line allowed the Nittany Lions to keep possession in Michigan's zone as Zach Saar (Richland, Mich.) won a corner battle to DeRosa, who found Tommy Olczyk (Long Grove, Ill.) in the slot. His shot was blocked and the puck fluttered in the air, eventually falling to DeRosa's skates as he turned and fired.
The line of Olczyk-DeRosa-Saar finished with a goal, two assists and a plus-2 rating for the night. DeRosa also went 5-1 on faceoffs with the help of his wingers.
Penn State continued to pressure the Michigan defense and would later have another power play opportunity. While chances were created, the Nittany Lions came up empty and went into the second intermission up 3-2, looking to keep its perfect 15-0-0 record intact when leading after two periods.
Following a penalty kill to start the third period, Penn State needed two big saves by McAdam to keep the Wolverines at bay, who were swarming his net. Eventually, Boo Nieves put away a Sam Piazza feed after only 2:19 of action to even the score.
McAdam would again be called upon to make an important save on a Michael Downing breakaway a couple minutes later to keep the game even at three apiece.
Michigan would jump ahead 4-3 on a Justin Selman goal as he put away a shot from the slot after an inch-perfect pass from Tony Calderone found his stick with 9:10 remaining in the game.
The Wolverines doubled its advantage when Tyler Motte, whose line was kept in check all night until that point, scored his 21st of the year from JT Compher with 5:15 to go. After a Penn State major penalty, the Nittany Lions pulled McAdam for an extra skater and a 5-on-5 situation as Motte intercepted a PSU pass and scored the empty netter with 1:55 to go for the final 6-3 score line.
In the first, Alex Kile put the Wolverines ahead as a Dexter Dancs pass deflected off Nieves' stick and Kile put away the wrister form the slot with 5;05 to go.
Penn State scored a crucial goal with 40.7 remaining when Pedrie's excellent work on the right dashers resulted in a perfect pass to Goodwin who was parked in front to tip the puck in the net. Penn State held a 15-13 edge in shots in the opening 20 minutes, but would be out-shot 36-22 the rest of the way, including 22-11 in the third.
NITTANY NOTES
Penn State was out-shot for just the third time all season, as Michigan held a 49-36 advantage. The Wolverines fired 49 shots on goal in both games of the series, the most allowed by Penn State this year.
Penn State continues to lead the series, 6-5-0, over the Wolverines.
Penn State fell to 0-2-0 all-time at Madison Square Garden and 2-2-0 at NHL venues this season.
Penn State scored at least three goals in a game for the 20th time this season (16-4-0). The Nittany Lions are 3-1-0 when scoring four goals. Michigan registered at least five goals in a game for the 15th time.
Vince Pedrie now leads the team in points by a defenseman with 16 (6g, 10a). Pedrie has registered points in six of the past eight games.
Ricky DeRosa scored his first goal since Dec. 5, 2015 vs. Michigan State.
David Goodwin leads the team with 22 points this season with seven goals and 15 assists.
Eamon McAdam's previous career-high save total came Jan. 12, 2014 against No. 1 Minnesota.
Penn State allowed four goals in a period for the second time this season (Jan. 9, 2016 vs. Minnesota, 3rd)
Penn State played in front its fourth-largest crowd in program history at 13,479. Both the third-largest (15,027 vs. Cornell on Nov.30, 2014) and fourth-largest crowds were at Madison Square Garden.
NEXT TIME OUT
Penn State heads west to face Minnesota for a two-game series at Mariucci Arena Friday-Saturday, Feb. 5-6. Friday's game will be televised by Big Ten Network and BTN2Go at 8 p.m. ET, while Saturday's game will be carried live by Fox Sports North and BTN2Go at 5 p.m. ET.