Cornell, Dartmouth Battle In Friday Night Tie

The No. 7-ranked Cornell men’s hockey team and Dartmouth battled to a 2-2 tie before another sold-out crowd of 4,361 at Lynah Rink on Friday night.

Sophomore Dalton Bancroft and junior defenseman Tim Rego recorded the goals for the Big Red (4-0-1, 2-0-1 ECAC Hockey), who saw its season-opening four-game win streak end.

John Fusco scored both goals for Dartmouth (1-1-3, 1-0-3 ECAC Hockey), who also had a 31-save performance from sophomore goaltender Cooper Black.

“You got to give credit where it’s due,” said Mike Schafer ’86, the Jay R. Bloom ’77 Head Coach of Cornell Men’s Ice Hockey. “Cooper Black played unbelievable tonight. He’s a tough goalie to beat. We had a lot of different scoring chances on him tonight, and I think our guys got frustrated as the game went on. I thought we got away from our game plan against them.”

Following a scoreless first period, Cornell opened the scoring 39 seconds into the contest on a goal by Bancroft. Freshman forward Jonathan Castagna set up Bancroft’s tally, capitalizing on intercepting a Dartmouth pass inside its defensive zone.

Fusco would score the following two goals to give Dartmouth a 2-1 lead with under four minutes to play. The first tally came immediately after a faceoff win by Luke Haymes in the Big Green’s offensive zone. Nikita Nikora chipped the puck back to Fusco at the right side of the point and his shot found its way past Cornell goaltender Ian Shane, who finished the night with 20 saves. Fusco’s latter goal came on a goalmouth scramble.

Cornell tied the game at 2-all with 59 seconds left in the middle stanza as freshman defenseman Ben Robertson found Rego in the low slot at the bottom of the right faceoff circle, setting up Rego’s one-timed goal.

Neither team scored in the third period or overtime as Shane stole the show by recording six of the seven saves in the extra five-minute segment.

In the shootout, Bancroft beat Black to his low blocker side to ignite the scoring in the…