Jan. 3: Northeastern capitalized on a late odd-man rush to snap a 2-2 tie and tacked on an empty net goal for a 4-2 win over St. Lawrence, extending its unbeaten streak to four games and the Saints winless streak to six in the final non-league game of the season for SLU.
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Junior Kevin Roy, who missed Friday's game as a last minute scratch with the flu, returned to action for Northeastern and was the difference in the game as he scored two goals and set up a third.
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Roy put the Huskies up 2-1 in the second period with both goals coming on the power play, and while the Saints tied it up and had some chances to take a lead, Northeastern finally snapped the tie when Mike Szmatula finished off a two-on-one break after the Saints lost the puck at the blue line with his seventh of the year on a blast under the crossbar with 1:29 to play in regulation. Roy then added the empty netter with 43 seconds left as Northeastern improves to 6-10-2 overall and the Saints fall to 8-9-2.
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The Saints scored the only goal of the first period as freshman defenseman
Matt Purmal pinched from the blue line, took a pass from Pat Doherty and rifled his third of the year past NU goalie Derick Roy at 14:42 with
Chris Martin also assisting on the play.
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Northeastern came back to take a 2-1 lead in the second period with a pair of power play goals. Kevin Roy got the first, his sixth of the season, when his shot trickled through the pads of Hayton at 6:03 and Dalen Hedges was all alone in front of Hayton and scored his fourth of the year off a pass by Roy at 15:26.
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Gunnar Hughes scored his second of the series and sixth of the season to tie it with 1:12 to go in the second period. He took the puck from Doherty and fed
Gavin Bayreuther, who put a shot on goal that Roy kicked out, but Hughes pounced on the rebound and put it under the crossbar.
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Hayton finished with 16 saves for the Saints while Roy had 21 for Northeastern. The Saints went scoreless in four power play chances while Northeastern finished two for five.
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The Saints will host Colgate on Friday and Cornell on Saturday at Appleton Arena as ECAC play resumes.
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