WORCESTER, Mass. (January 20, 2024) – Buoyed by an overtime win at home on Friday night, the Sacred Heart University men's ice hockey team went on the road on Saturday, looking for a weekend sweep of Holy Cross. Instead, a series which has traditionally been controlled by the home team held to that trend. Holy Cross got a timely third-period power-play goal from Alec Cicero and later tacked on a pair of empty-net tallies to pick up a 5-2 win in Atlantic Hockey play at the Hart Center.
 
The two teams traded goals in each of the first two periods. Holy Cross (12-11-4, 7-9-3 AHA) got things started 5:15 into the proceedings. Mark Oliphant took the initial shot down low on the right-wing side, but missed the target. Jack Ricketts tracked down the loose puck on the left side and slipped home a shot from a sharp angle to notch his team-leading 11^th goal of the year.
 
SHU (11-12-2, 11-7-1 AHA) -- which is now 25-16-4 all-time against the Crusaders on home ice, but 16-26-2 at the Hart Center – responded a little over eight minutes later, with a power-play tally at 13:31. Mikey Adamson (Quincy, Mass.) took a shot from the right point, which bounced off Braeden Tuck (Calgary, Alberta) out front. The puck ricocheted straight to John Jaworski (Grinnell, Iowa) at the left post, and he salted away his second of the weekend and 10^th of the season.


It would be the only power play of the night for the Pioneers, who ceded five man-advantage opportunities to Holy Cross, which would eventually come back to bite them.
 
"Give credit to Holy Cross, they really played hard tonight," said SHU head coach C.J. Marottolo after the game. "I thought the difference in this game was one thing, and it was we were undisciplined tonight."
 
First though, SHU took a 2-1 lead 4:05 into the second period. Jaworski made it a four-point weekend (2-2-4), as he fired the puck down the right wing to spring Andrius Kulbis-Marino (Methuen, Mass.) into the offensive end. Kulbis-Marino snapped home his fourth of the campaign – and third in the last five games – from the right circle on the rush.
 
Holy Cross put the puck in the net on the power play at 9:36, but had the goal disallowed, due to goaltender interference. It would turn into a prolonged man advantage, which included nine seconds of 5-on-3 time, as the Pios took another penalty shortly thereafter.
 
SHU would kill off all the penalty time, technically, but the Crusaders struck to tie the game just five seconds after their power-play expired, at 11:45. Ty Gagno had his shot blocked from the top of the right circle, and Matt DeBoer's second effort was turned aside by Justin Robbins (Alpine, N.J.). Third time was the charm though, as John Gelatt finished off his fifth of the year at the right post.
 
SHU killed off another penalty which carried over into the third period, but a boarding minor to Liam Izyk (Blackie, Alberta) at 3:00 of the third finally caused the levee to break. Holy Cross needed just 12 seconds to convert, as Alec Cicero set up shop on the left wing and tried to find a passing lane across to Gelatt, who was stationed at the right post. The pass never got there though, as instead it deflected off Hunter Sansbury (Lomita, Calif.) and wound up in the net for Cicero's eighth of the season.
 
"We took five penalties, they took one; that's the difference in the game," continued Marottolo. "We'll certainly address that moving forward. Disappointing game in terms of our discipline, but we'll fix it, and we'll move on."
 
It was the toughest of breaks for Sansbury, who sacrificed his body all weekend in the Pioneers' defensive end. The junior co-captain added seven more blocked shots on Saturday, to match his new career best from Friday night and finish with 14 blocks across the weekend.
 
SHU got Robbins to the bench in the final minutes, but Holy Cross tacked on empty-net goals from Matt Guerra at 18:18 and Cicero at 19:44 to finish off the 5-2 victory.
 
Robbins (3-3-0) tallied 26 saves against 29 shots in defeat in the SHU net. Thomas Gale (6-8-2) made 24 stops against 26 shots in the Holy Cross crease.
 
Sacred Heart makes its final foray out of Atlantic Hockey next weekend, for the annual CT Ice tournament, featuring Connecticut's four Division I men's ice hockey programs. The Pioneers will open play on Friday at 4 p.m. against host Connecticut, at the XL Center in downtown Hartford. The entire tournament is set to air live on SNY in the tri-state area.