#3 Fitchburg State Clipped By #6 UMass Dartmouth, 5-4

Bedard, Carlette, Johannesson and Nussbaum net goals for Falcons

FITCHBURG, Mass. – The third seed Fitchburg State University ice hockey team dropped a 5-4 decision to the sixth seeded Corsairs of UMass Dartmouth in quarterfinal round action of the 2014-15 Massachusetts State Collegiate Athletic Conference (MASCAC) ice hockey post-season tournament this evening at the Wallace Civic Center.

With the win, UMass Dartmouth improves to 8-15-3 (6-9-3 MASCAC) and advances to the semifinal round on Tuesday as it travels to Salem State to take on the second seeded Vikings for a contest starting at 7 p.m. Fitchburg State concludes the 2014-15 season with an overall record of 10-13-3 and an 8-8-2 mark in conference play.

UMass Dartmouth opened the scoring just 28 seconds into the first period as junior forward Mike Restuccia wristed a shot into the lower left corner of the net for his sixth marker of the season on assists from classmates Billy Boudreau and Brandon Gilmore for the 1-0 margin.

The Corsairs doubled their lead (2-0) at the 4:10 mark when freshman forward Casey Shea slide a pass over to Gilmore in front of the net, who proceeded to fire a shot into the back of net for this tenth tally on the year.

In the middle frame, the visitors upped its advantage at the 16:26 mark as freshman Jaret Babych gathered a feed from classmate Michael Palmer and deposited the puck into the back of the net for his eighth tally of the season for the 3-0 lead after two periods of play.

In the third period, UMass Dartmouth took a four goal lead at the just 1:21 into the stanza when sophomore Mike Kelly blasted a shot inside the far post for his eighth score of the year for the 4-0 margin as classmate Matt Baldino assisted on the play.

Fitchburg State broke its scoring silence at the 4:59 mark as sophomore Jon Johannesson gathered a pair of feeds from juniors Paul Falanga and Ryan Bedard to make the score 4-1 before senior Brett Nussbaum buried a shot into the back of the net to cut the deficit to 4-2, roughly 1:30 later.

The Green and Gold answered again at the 7:06 mark (4-3), converting with the man advantage when junior forward Stephen Carlette blasted a shot from the left faceoff dot into the lower right corner for his fifth tally of the season.

The Corsairs responded with just under eight minutes remaining in the contest as Babytch struck for his second goal on the afternoon, rifling a shot inside the near post for his ninth marker of the season, for the 5-3 advantage.

The hosts continued to battle back, reducing the deficit to one at the 13:58 mark when Falanga collected a loose puck in the offensive end before finding Bedard at the top of the left point, who then one-timed a shot into the net, resulting in the 5-4 final.

Throughout the contest, Fitchburg State held a 44-32 advantage in shots, while the Corsairs finished 0-for-1 on the power-play. Between the pipes, seniors Ryan Wysocki and Dan Finn combined to make 27 saves for the Falcons, while sophomore JJ Solloway stopped 40 shots en-route to his eighth win for UMass Dartmouth.

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