Men's Hockey ties conference rival Norwich
The New England College Pilgrims and Norwich University Cadets skated to a hard fought 2-2 tie Saturday afternoon in Henniker. With the tie the Pilgrims move to 12-6-1 overall, while the Cadets are now 10-5-3 overall on the season.
The two teams play evenly through much of the opening period before NEC’s Olli Kalliosaari (Hattula, Finland) would score off a nice pass from Johan Granath (Stockholm, Sweden) at the 14:51 mark. Norwich would hold the slight 15-10 lead in shots on net in the first period but Pilgrim goalie Aaron Harvey (Milford, Nova Scotia) would stop all 15 shots keeping the Cadets off the board.
Again the two teams would battle through a majority of the second period scoreless as the Cadets would hold a commanding 15-7 lead in shots on net. Norwich’s persistence on offense would pay off as Greg Eskedjian (Barrie, Ontario) would convert on a Cadet power-play opportunity with just 59 seconds remaining in the second, knotting the game at 1-1. NEC would respond quickly as Granath would rebound in a Kalliosaari shot just 21 seconds later giving the Pilgrims the 2-1 advantage heading into the final period.
Norwich’s Eric Tallent (Garland, Texas) would tie the game early in the third period scoring the Cadets second power-play goal of the afternoon just 2:42 into the period. The teams would battle through the remainder of regulation and overtime scoreless as each team would have to settle for the 2-2 tie.
Leading the way for NEC was Olli Kallisaari who netted a goal and dished out an assist. Leading the way for Norwich was Eric Tallent who scored a goal and had an assist.
In net for NEC was Aaron Harvey (Milford, Nova Scotia) who recorded an impressive 44 saves on the evening. In net for Norwich was Ryan Klingensmith (Morton, Pa.) who finished with 25 saves.
