Men's Hockey sees tie game change in a hurry, falls 6-2

Mendota Heights, Minn. -- Michigan Tech broke open a deadlocked hockey game with three goals in a 6:15 span of period en route to a 6-2 road victory over Tommie Men's Hockey in Friday night's CCHA game at Saint Thomas Ice Arena.

The Huskies (7-3-2 overall, 3-2-2 CCHA) used two power-play goals sandwiched around a short-handed goal to turn a 2-2 tie into a 5-2 lead.

The visitors, who are receiving votes just outside of the USCHO national top-25 poll, collected their first five goals from five different players. Goalie Blake Pietila had another strong game as he stopped 25 of 27 shots.

The Tommies (2-11, 1-6) pulled goalie Aaron Trotter on a few occasions in the late stretches to try to generate a goal, and MTU eventually converted an empty-net score with 2:05 remaining for the final margin.

Jarrett Lee and Luke Manning scored the St. Thomas goals.

Lee's goal was his first as a Tommie and his first college goals since February 2019 playing with Northern Michigan, covering his last 54 games. Manning's goal was his 19th in 84 games on his D-I career.

Quoting Coach Rico Blasi:

"(Michigan Tech) outplayed us in every aspect of the game and deserved to win, it was as simple as that.

"They are a good hockey team, you can't take stupid penalties (against a team like that). That short-handed goal (we allowed), you can't let that happen.

"They took it to us, they deserved to win."

Next Up

The teams played again here Saturday (6:07 p.m. puck drop) to close the weekend series.

Did You Know?

MTU outshot the Toms 13-5 in period one. St. Thomas had an 18-9 edge in shots in the middle period to pull even on the contest, but MTU posted a 9-4 edge in shots in the last 20:00.

With all of its progress thus far from season one to season two of D-I play, St. Thomas is still looking to craft more complete games over all 60 minutes. The Purple have led or been tied in the third period in five of their losses, and overall have seven defeats by one or two goals.

Trotter, who had 26 saves, tallied his first college assist as his slick pass up the middle to Manning was converted into a breakaway goal that tied the game 2-2 with 40 seconds left in period two.

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Men's Hockey sees tie game change in a hurry, falls 6-2

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Team Stats

Luke Manning

Jarrett Lee

Josh Eernisse

Ethan Gauer

Players Mentioned

Jarrett Lee

Luke Manning

Aaron Trotter

University of St. Thomas Athletics