UConn battles past UMass Lowell, 5-1

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UConn men’s hockey did just enough to come out with a 5-1 win over the UMass Lowell River Hawks on Saturday at Tsongas Center. The final score proved deceptive: The Huskies only led by one with 1:36 remaining before tagging on two empty-netters and a power play goal.

Kaden Shahan and Joey Muldowney each scored twice while Ryan Tattle added one as well. Jake Richard notched three assists.

Kam Hendrickson started between the pipes and earned his first career victory. He stopped the final 27 shots that came his way and finished 28 of 29 on the night.

UConn’s penalty kill came up big. While it gave up a goal on its first attempt, it responded by going 4-4 the rest of the way — three of which came in the third period. The power play went 1-4, though that was inflated by Shahan’s second goal with 10 seconds left.

For the second straight game, UConn fell behind 1-0. After an early penalty on Carlin Dezainde, UMass Lowell converted on the power play when Diego Buttazzoni found a wide-open Luke Shipley on the back post.

The Huskies almost answered immediately with three consecutive good looks in tight but they couldn’t bury any of them. Despite coming up empty there, they eventually pulled even thanks to one of their best goals of the season. Shahan skated in on a 2v1, deked around a defender and placed a shot top-shelf for his six goal of the season.

Soon after, UMass Lowell should’ve gone back ahead but were denied by an unbelievable back-door save by Hendrickson. The teams eventually went into the first intermission knotted at 1-1.

Early in the second period, UConn took its first lead of the weekend. Richard forced a turnover just inside the blue line and put back-to-back shots on net. The latter snuck through the goaltender and trickled toward the goal line, where Muldowney poked it in to give the Huskies a 2-1 lead.

After that, UConn spent much of the stanza in its own zone. Despite getting out-shot 15-10, Hendrickson and the defense stood tall to send the Huskies into the intermission up by one.

UConn didn’t make life easy for itself in the third period. Tattle first took a tripping penalty and then got hit by the puck as he exited the box, which sent him back in for another two minutes. The senior appeared to get redemption when he scored soon after the latter penalty expired but the goal was overturned on replay for offsides.

With 6:41 left, the Huskies took their third penalty of the period but the PK unit again came up big to preserve the one-goal lead.

UMass Lowell pulled the goalie for the extra skater with 2:33 remaining, though UConn quickly capitalized. After the puck ended up down the River Hawks’ end, Richard forced a turnover at the blue line and got it to Muldowney, who buried it into the empty net.

The hosts again vacated the net with 48.0 seconds left but UConn added another ENG. Muldowney could’ve tried for the hat trick but with a defender on him, he passed it to an open Tattle, who scored the Huskies’ fourth of the night. UMass Lowell took a cheap shot on Tattle after the goal, putting UConn on the power play.

Despite the limited time remaining, the Huskies capitalized when Shahan buried a shot into the twine for his second of the night. That brought the scoreline final, 5-1.

With the win, UConn improves to 12-6-3 on the season and 8-4-1 in Hockey East. Next, the Huskies will host Vermont for a pair beginning on Friday.

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