Jan. 16: Out of the lineup at breakfast, sophomore Alexander Dahl turned out to be the hero for St. Lawrence University's men's hockey team as his first goal of the year 11:24 into the second period proved to be the game-winner in a big 3-2 ECAC Hockey win at Dartmouth on Friday night.
 
Dahl was inserted as fourth line center at the team's pre-game skate after the original starter, junior Sean McGovern was sidelined by illness. Dahl then boosted the Saints to a 3-0 lead with his first goal of the season, taking a pass from Chris Martin and banking a shot in off the post to become the 22^nd different Saint player to score a goal this season at 11:24 of the third.
 
It turned into the game winner when Dartmouth scored the game's final two goals, one on a second period rebound and the other on an extra attacker goal with 1:29 to go, but freshman goaltender Kyle Hayton turned in another huge effort to preserve the Saint win.
 
"That was a real gutsy road win," said Saint coach Greg Carvel. "It was an uneven game…certainly nothing like last week's Colgate game…there was no flow because of all the penalties and special teams play, but the guys found a way to win, and that is good for this group because we haven't always been able to do that this season.:
 
SLU improves to 10-10-2 overall and 6-4-0 in the conference while Dartmouth falls to 6-7-3, 3-5-1 in league play after the Saints earned their fourth straight win in Hanover.
 
The Saints scored the lone goal of the first period on a shorthander as Gunnar Hughes pressured a Dartmouth defender in his own end, knocking the puck off his stick and past Big Green goalie Charles Grant at 16:23 for Hughes' seventh of the year, an unassisted shorthanded goal.
 
The Saints made it a 2-0 game just 2:26 into the second period as junior center Brian Ward took a pass from freshman Joe Sullivan and one-timed a bullet past Grant from the left faceoff dot with Drew Smolcynski also assisting. It was Ward's sixth goal of the year. Dahl then made it a 3-0 Saint lead on his shot from Martin before Dartmouth mounted its comeback.
 
Eric Neiley got the first one, putting back a rebound on a backhander under the crossbar at 16:25 of the second and after a host of power play chances by both teams through the second and third periods, Brandon McNally made it a one goal game at 18:31 as he picked up a rebound off a blocked shot to make it a 3-2 game.
 
Hayton made 16 of his 36 saves in the third period to earn the win, while Grant finished with 19 stops for Dartmouth.
 
The Saints killed off seven Dartmouth power plays in the game, allowing just four shots on goal in the seven, but were scoreless in five power play chances of their own.