Junior forward Jordan Steinmetz scored his first goal of the season, but the St. Lawrence University men's hockey team fell to RIT 2-1 on Saturday night in front of 6,753 fans at Blue Cross Arena in Rochester, New York.

The Scarlet and Brown moved to 1-1-1 on the young season, while RIT improved to 2-1-1.

"I thought we had a good start to the game, but then we got away from playing a heavier style," said Charles W. Appleton Head Men's Hockey Coach Brent Brekke "RIT is really good in transition and countered well on some of our offensive opportunities, which ended up in chances the other way going against us. We need to possess the puck more and be harder in the tough areas. It will be good to have next weekend with some of the injuries we have sustained in these first two weeks of games. We have another good series against a strong opponent coming up against Lake Superior State."

The Saints struck first in the game off a beautiful passing play from the Scarlet and Brown. Aleksi Peltonen carried the puck into the RIT defensive zone and dished the puck off to Ashton Fry. Fry made the give-and-go play passing it back to Peltonen, who stopped and centered a feed to Steinmetz, who was alone in front of Kolby Matthews. Steinmetz beat the Tigers' goalie for the 1-0 lead and his first goal of the season.

It looked as if St. Lawrence took a two-goal lead later in the first as there was a scramble in front of the RIT net that led to Oak Macleod and the Saints celebrating a presumed goal. After a video review, it was determined the first-year forward ran into the goaltender, keeping the score at 1-0 going into intermission.

Jake Joffe would end up evening the contest at the 11:25 mark of the second period for the Tigers. Joffe's equalizer was setup by Aiden Hansen-Bukata and Nick Bruce to tie the game at one apiece.

St. Lawrence nearly broke the tie with 4:21 left in the second period off a beautiful no-look pass from captain Kaden Pickering. Pickering's pass found fellow captain David Jankowski right in front of the frame, but Matthews was able to turn away the effort to keep it a 1-1 game.

Less than five minutes into the third period RIT's most dangerous scorer Andrew Rinaldi found himself on a breakaway against Emil Zetterquist. Zetterquist calmly steered Rinaldi to the post and made the easy save to keep the game tied.

However, moments later a defensive miscue led to the Tigers taking the lead. Kobe Walker was pressuring the Saints' defense and caused a turnover behind the net. Walker took the loose puck and found Will Calverley, who scored the one-timer goal from the side of the net to put the score at 2-1.

St. Lawrence pushed late for a game-tying tally, and was nearly successful on multiple occasions. Most notably, David Jankowski poked the puck away from a pinching defenseman to spark a 3-on-1 opportunity. The Saints had three great looks off the odd man rush, but came away empty as Matthews stood tall in net.

The Saints pulled Zetterquist with 1:44 left in regulation and applied heavy pressure. St. Lawrence was able to get four shots off in the final minute and change, but were stopped three times by Matthews, and blocked by the Tigers' defense to close out the contest.

The Scarlet and Brown had the 33-27 advantage in shots during the game.

Both team's penalty kill units were exceptional allowing one shot combined in five total power plays. St. Lawrence remains perfect on the year during man-down situations at 11-11.

Zetterquist stopped 25 shots for the Saints in 58:16 of action, while Matthews finished with 32 saves after getting dinged up in the first period.

The Scarlet and Brown will have next week off as they prepare for their trip to Lake Superior State University on Friday, October 29th. The Saints will play a two-game set with the Lakers starting at 7:07 p.m. on Friday, and 6:07 p.m. on Saturday.