CANISIUS COLLEGE ATHLETICS
Freshman Kyle Betts recorded his first collegiate hat trick to power No. 5 Cornell to a 6-2 victory over No. 20 Canisius in collegiate men’s ice hockey action Saturday at Lynah Rink in Ithaca, N.Y.
Trevor Yates chipped in two goals and an assist while Jeff Malott assisted on all three of Betts’ tallies to help propel the Big Red (11-2-0) to the victory in the matchup of nationally-ranked opponents. SophomoreNick Hutchison and junior Dylan McLaughlinaccounted for the two Golden Griffins’ (10-6-1) goals.
Betts staked Cornell to a 1-0 lead at the 16:18 mark of the first period when he put home Malott’s centering feed.
Hutchison tied the game at 1-1 early in the second period with a power-play tally, sliding the puck past Big Red goaltender Hayden Stewart to finish off a Canisius rush for his ninth of the campaign.
Cornell responded to Hutchison’s tally with three unanswered goals, highlighted by a pair of tallies in a 1:20 span, to build a 4-1 lead.
Yates began the game-changing sequence with 9:17 elapsed in the middle frame, beating Griffs sophomore keeper Daniel Urbani with a wrist shot to the blocker side.
Betts doubled the Big Red cushion to 3-1 just 80 seconds later, converting a feed from Malott for his second goal of the game before completing his hat trick with a wrist shot that snuck between the pads of Urbani with 5:34 to play in the second.
McLaughlin made it a 4-2 contest just 12 seconds into the third period with his team-leading 12th goal of the season. Yates and Morgan Barron scored 3:30 apart midway through the frame to determine the final margin.
Stewart recorded 24 saves for Cornell. Urbani stopped 22 shots for Canisius before being replaced in the third period by fellow sophomore Blake Weyrick, who finished with 13 saves.
Head Coach Trevor Large‘s Postgame Comments
“For us to continue to get better, we have to play against good teams. Playing on the road against a really good Cornell team, that experience helps any team, and it certainly helps us moving forward. It gives us an understanding of how hard we need play; how we need to play together as a unit for three periods. Those lessons are important in any game, but especially when playing good teams such as Cornell.
“We had some momentum early in the second period. We scored a great power-play goal, but that seemed to wake them up. The puck was in our end for a good chunk of time. We were trying to weather a couple of storms, but what happens late in a shift is puck movement starts to slow down, we’re not getting the puck out, and then we’re having to defend longer. When you’re going for extra-long shifts against good teams, they’re able to get fresh legs on the ice and keep you in your zone. We were unable to come up with the big play in those situations tonight, whether it was a save, a block or a chip out, that would allow us to get a change and that definitely hurt us.”
Game Notes
- Saturday’s contest served as just the second meeting between the two Empire State foes and the first since the 2004-05 campaign.
- Canisius moved to 3-3 versus nationally-ranked competition in 2017-18 with Saturday’s setback. The game was the Griffs fourth straight against a ranked opponent.
- The Griffs were 1-for-3 with the man advantage as Canisius recorded a power-play goal in a game for the 14th time in 17 contests in 2017-18.
- Junior Dylan McLaughlin extended his point-scoring streak to a career-high 12 games with his two-point effort on Saturday. McLaughlin has recorded two or more points in nine of 16 games played this season.
- Senior Ryan Schmelzer picked up an assist on Saturday, giving him 97 career points and moving just three away from becoming the 11th in the Division I era of the program to reach the 100-point plateau for his career.
- Sophomore Nick Hutchison recorded his fourth power-play goal of the season on Saturday, moving him into a tie with McLaughlin for first place on the team in that category.
- Sophomore goaltender Blake Weyrick and freshman defenseman Blake Wareham both made their collegiate debuts in the contest.
Up Next
No. 20 Canisius completes its home-and-home series with No. 4 Clarkson Jan. 2 with a 7:05 p.m. contest at Cheel Arena in Potsdam, N.Y.