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| Sean Malone scored his first collegiate hat-trick to lead Harvard over Quinnipiac in the ECAC semi-finals. |
LAKE PLACID, N.Y. – Harvard didn’t need its scoring depth nor its power-play finesse to advance to the ECAC Championship on Saturday. The nation’s No. 2 team only needed Sean Malone’s finishing touch in the 4-1 victory against Quinnipiac in a semifinal. Malone, a senior forward from West Seneca, N.Y., found the back of the net three times—the first hat-trick in an ECAC semifinal since Todd White scored three for Clarkson in 1997. Malone is now just two points shy of hitting the century mark in his collegiate career.
“It’s pretty special,” said Malone on collecting his first hat-trick in his three seasons with the Crimson. “It feels good to do it in a big game like this. More importantly I’m just happy we got the win.
Two of Malone’s three goals came seven minutes apart in the
second period. The first came from a quick turnaround after Craig Martin was
hit off the puck, while the second Malone threw from the red line on goal.
Malone capped off his scoring as he brought the puck in through the zone and
neatly played the puck in the crease to slip it past Quinnipiac goaltender
Andrew Shortridge early in the third.
“We need our best players to step up and we’ve seen that
throughout, starting with last weekend,” said Harvard forward Luke Esposito.
“We needed a spark and the greatest thing about our team is that it can come
from any player.”
After a scoreless first period, Harvard continued to throw
pucks on net, amassing 35 during the game. Merrick Madsen was tested with 26
shots on goal, 15 of which came in the third period. Madsen’s only goal against
came on a Quinnipiac power play on a tuck in on his blocker side by Thomas
Aldworth, who found a sliver of space between Madsen’s side and the net.
“Sometimes it’s difficult to stick with the game, I think I
only had five or six shots in the first,” said Madsen. “It’s hard to play in
this type of venue but I think it made it easier for me to stay with it.”
Harvard will face Cornell, a 4-1 winner over Union in the
other ECAC semifinal. The Crimson own a 2-0 record against the Big Red this
season.
The loss marks the end of the road for Quinnipiac in the
playoffs. The only way the Bobcats, ranked No. 19 in the country, could have earned a guaranteed
return to the NCAA Tournament would have come by reclaiming the Whitelaw Cup—awarded
to the winner of the ECAC postseason tournament. This was the third straight
year the Bobcats had played the Crimson in the playoffs, with the series now
2-1 in Harvard’s favor.
“I give Quinnipiac credit—they kept coming, and they kept
making plays,” said Harvard coach Ted Donato, the former Boston Bruins star who
played at Harvard and was a member of the 1992 U.S. Olympic hockey team. “We’ve
had some battles with them for the last three years.” Donato also did short
stints for both Connecticut AHL teams, the Bridgeport Sound Tigers and Hartford
Wolf Pack. “In some ways, I feel like our seniors think—you can’t win the ECAC
unless you play Quinnipiac along the lines,” he added.
Quinnipiac’s seniors represent the winningest class in Bobcats’
history. Accolades for the class of 2017 included three NCAA Tournament berths,
two Cleary Cups (awarded to the ECAC regular-season winner), a Whitelaw Cup and
an NCAA Tournament championship game appearance. The class also stands with North
Dakota as the only two programs to feature 100-win senior class with 102
overall victories.
“In the end, it’s about our senior class,” Quinnipiac coach
Rand Pecknold said. “It’s really a nice group of young men who have helped to
put our program on the map.”
—USCHO
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