McKenzie Scores Overtime Winner at Colgate

by: 

Wally Johnson

Aaron Bogosian's power play goal got the Saints started at Colgate on Saturday

Mike McKenzie's 99^th career point in his St. Lawrence University hockey career may turn into a big point in the ECAC Hockey standings as McKenzie was credited with the game winning goal with 42 seconds to play in overtime as the Saints tipped Colgate 3-2 Saturday night to gain a split of its road weekend.

The Saints went into Saturday's game in fourth place in the ECAC standings, a point ahead of Colgate. A total of three points separated the top three teams in the standings going into Saturday's games.  The Saint victory on Saturday improves their record to 14-9-4 overall and 8-4-2 in league play and leaves them in a three-way tie for second with Union and Yale with 18 points.

The game winning goal capped a strong final 24 minutes for the Saints, who had trouble mustering offense through the first 40 minutes. Travis Vermeulen started the winning play, sending the puck back to Matt Raley at the point. Raley waited until a lane cleared and rifled a shot toward net which hit McKenzie in the back of the leg and deflected into the back of the net at 4:18 to win it.

The Saints had to come from behind twice to tie it as Colgate took a 1-0 lead with a second period goal and went back up 2-1 just seconds after the Saints had tied it early in the third.

"Obviously that is a huge result for us," said Saint coach Joe Marsh. "We turned in a solid third period at both ends of the ice and I thought we carried it over into the overtime. The game with Colgate at our place was a lot closer than the score would indicate, and tonight's game was another battle."

The Saints came out with plenty of zip and pressured Colgate early, but the Raiders were given four first period power play chances and generated six of their nine shots with the man advantage. The Saints put on a penalty-killing clinic in the first period and did not allow more than two shots on goal on any of the four Raider power play opportunities.

Colgate scored the game's first goal midway through the second period as sophomore Matt Firman finished off a two-on-two by deflecting a goal mouth pass by Brian Day into the corner of the net at 10:31. Firman gained just a slight edge on a Saint defender and reached out to redirect the perfect pass as Tisi did not have a chance to make a save on the play.

The Raiders, who had two more power play chances in the second period, did not let the Saints get much going offensively, allowing just four shots on goal in the period and ten shots through the first.

SLU tied the game on a power play just 1:18 into the second as McKenzie took a shot from the top of the faceoff circle which fluttered after hitting a defender's stick. Aaron Bogosian was right in front of Colgate goalie Alex Evin and tipped the puck past him to make it a 1-1 game.

The Raiders went back up 2-1 in a scramble in front of Saint goalie Kain Tisi at 1:54 as Brian Day scored his 16^th of the season, but the Saints came back to tie it again when Raley took a pass from Jacob Drewiske and put a hard shot on net which Evin kicked out. Brandon Bollig pounced on the rebound and tucked it back into the net at 8:03.

Both Evin and Tisi came up with some big saves to keep it tied through the rest of regulation and into the overtime until the game-winning deflection off McKenzie gave the Saints the win.

Tisi finished with 31 saves, allowing two goals of less for the ninth time in ten games in the month of January.

Evin finished with 28 saves for Colgate, 18 of them in the second period and overtime.