BY: Gerry Cantlon, Howlings
BOSTON, MA – In the battle of the Huskies, #15 ranked Northeastern’s Devon Levi put up a 60-save effort to defeat #19 ranked UCONN, 3-1 at Matthews Arena Friday night.
“That was the most shots we’ve had since I’ve been here,” said UCONN Head Coach Mike Cavanaugh. “We had a lot of quality shots. I like the way our team played. Some nights you get 60-some shots on goal, so we’re right back at it tomorrow afternoon.”
UCONN falls to 17-13-0 overall and 13-8-0 in Hockey East. Northeastern improved to 21-10-1 overall and 12-8-1.
It’s unlikely the team will make any line changes or revise their game plan for the rematch.
“You take 60-some odd shots on net; I don’t think we’ll change game plans (tomorrow),” Cavanaugh replied.
UCONN Huskies started a critical late-season series with Northeastern in Beantown on a snowy Friday.
Northeastern expanded their lead to 2-0 on a quick counter-attack breakout early in the third period on a two-on-one. Aidan McDonough, known more as a goalscorer, sent a perfect pass across the box to Ty Jackson, who screamed down the left-wing side and found a way to get his fifth goal past Darion Hanson at 2:47.
The rest was “The Devon Levi Show,” as the Northeastern netminder stopped 26 of the 27 UCONN shots. Carter Turnbull had a Hockey East record twelve shots on goal. Unfortunately, the records from earlier years are incomplete, so there is no way to confirm if it’s a UCONN record.
Marc Gatcomb had ten shots in a rare hockey feat to have two players shooting in double digits.
Kevin O’Neil put up eight, Artem Schlaine had six, as did their seventh defenseman Jarrod Gourley.
Only John Wojciechowski and Jake Veilleux failed to register a shot on goal for the game.
The chances to score came everywhere, and anyone Hudson Schandor (six shots) had a backhander on two-on-one stopped by Levi on the right-wing in front.
Schandor ruined Levi’s bid for a tenth shutout with the extra attacker on the ice at 18:08. Schandor banged in a loose puck off a Jachym Kondelik shot for his fifth of the year.
Levi capped his night by picking up the only assist on McDonough’s empty-net goal to close out the scoring.
The shots by UCONN were the most since February 26, 2021, against Maine (52).
In the second period, UCONN maintained an overall shot advantage of 19-10, but no goals.
FIRST GOAL
Northeastern grabbed the first goal off a long dump-in from their defensive end of the ice.
John Spetz had trouble controlling the puck and lost the biscuit to Aidan McDonough.
McDonough, the conference’s top goalscorer, went behind the UCONN net. Gourley was coming on for his shift and raced around the net rather than to the front to cut off McDonough’s passing lane.
He would find his first liner, Gunnarwolfe Fontaine, alone in front. Fontaine deked netminder Darion Hanson and put his seventh away on the backhand at 10:47.
Nick Capone (East Haven/Salisbury School) made his presence known early with a big hit on Jack Hughes.
LINES
Firstov-Kondelik-O’Neil
Gatcomb-Evans-Turnbull
Schandor-Schlaine-Tverberg
Veilleux-Capone-Wojciechowski
Wheeler-Rees
Berger-Spetz
Kinal-Flynn
Gourley
Hanson
Terness
SCRATCHES
Cassidy Bowes
Gavin Puskar
Ryan Keane
Austin Metcalfe
Sasha Telguine
Matt Pasquale
