St. Cloud, Minn. – The Gustavus Adolphus men’s hockey team skated to a 1-1 tie but saw Saint John’s University pick up the extra point in the MIAC standings with a shootout win on Friday night at the National Hockey Center. After Jack Walsh (Sr., Mahtomedi, Minn.) scored the night’s opening goal less than two minutes into the third period, Saint John’s Kevin Becker netted the equalizer later in the 17th minute. The Gusties failed to convert on all three of their shootout attempts, while John Haeg capitalized on the the Johnnies’ third try to allow to allow the home team its second shootout win of the season.
Gustavus is now 2-3 in MIAC shootouts and heads into Saturday’s series-finale in a three-way tie for third place in the conference standings with 16 points at 6-7-7 overall and 3-3-5 in the MIAC. Saint John’s – now 2-0 in shootouts – is tied for sixth place with 15 points at 8-5-5 overall and 4-3-2 in the MIAC.
The two teams skated to a 0-0 draw through two periods. Saint John’s outshout Gustavus 12-to-5 in the first period, and Gustavus outshot Saint John’s 14-to-11 in the second. The Gusties failed to convert on two power plays in the opening ten minutes of the first period, and the Johnnies couldn’t capitalize on two power plays of their own in the final ten minutes of the same frame. The second period featured two penalties on Saint John’s and one on Gustavus, but neither team was able to capitalize.
The two squads moved on to the third period where finally a puck found the back of the net. The first goal of the game came at the 1:20 mark and was scored by Jack Walsh with assists coming from Cory Ellis (Sr., St. Paul, Minn.) and Darren Lapic (Jr., New Prague, Minn.). Walsh has scored his last two games and now has a total of three on the year.
With less than four minutes remaining in regulation, Kevin Becker snapped the shutout with a power play goal at the 16:53 mark.
Following a scoreless overtime session during which Gustavus outshot Saint John’s 3-1, the game went to a shootout where the Johnnies shot first. Becker missed on the opening attempt, and Jack Walsh followed suit for Gustavus. Andrew Commers started round two with a miss, and Sam Majka (So., Wayzata, Minn.) followed with a miss of his own. After John Haeg gave the Johnnies a 1-0 lead to start the third round, Tyler Lapic (Sr., New Prague, Minn.) couldn’t score the equalizer on Gustavus’s last attempt.
Saint John’s finished with a 35-to-29 edge in shots and went 1-for-4 on the power play. Gustavus finished 0-for-4 on the power play.
John McLean (Jr., Eagan, Minn.) turned away 34-of-35 shots and is now 3-3-2 with the draw. His counterpart, Saxton Soley, moves to 6-3-5 after making 28-of-29 saves.
The Gustavus men’s hockey team will look for its third straight Saturday win tomorrow night when it takes on Saint John’s in the series-finale at 7:05 p.m. at Don Roberts Ice Rink.