ANGOLA, Ind. – The Trine University men's hockey team tied the game late in the third quarter, but ultimately came up short of visiting Aurora University falling in the contest by the score of 5-3.
Much like last nights contest, the Thunder won the possession battle during the first half. They outshot the visiting Spartans 13-7 during the period. Neither team would score however and the teams would enter the first intermission still scoreless.
In the eighth minute of the second, Aurora took advantage of a power play opportunity to score the first goal of the day. The 1-0 lead would last for just over ten minutes.
After intercepting a pass in the neutral zone, senior Brendan Prappas carried the puck up the near boards and just into the offensive zone. Sophomore Drew Welsch collected the puck from there and sprinted ahead to even with the net, before passing it across the face to senior Frank Trazzera who shot the net into the empty backdoor for the goal.
The team's looked set to head to the second break in a 1-1 tie, but Aurora pieced together some very late offense scoring a second goal with just eight seconds remaining in the half to take back the lead at 2-1.
The Spartans built their lead to two in the tenth minute of the third to open a hectic final ten minutes of play and make the score 3-1.
The Thunder moved the puck into the offensive zone to start the 13th minute of play. It eventually ended up in the corner where senior Garrett Hallford was able to punch it back into the faceoff circle for sophomore Bobby Price. From there another quick pass gave the puck to senior Justin Meers who moved to the center of the ice and fired a shot into the back of the net from just outside the faceoff circles.
A little over four minutes later the Thunder would tie the contest again. Meers muddled an Aurora pass near the offensive blueline leaving the puck unpossessed just outside the offensive zone. Hallford collected it and skated straight forward to nearly even with the faceoff dots. His shot went into the back of the net and made the score 3-3 with 3:30 remaining in regulation.
A wide shot rebounded back to the front of the net on the opposite end of the ice leading to the Spartan's fourth goal, which came with 2:19 remaining in the game. The visitors added an empty net goal in the final minutes of play to make the score 5-3 for the victory.
Trine falls to 2-2 overall and 0-2 in Northern Collegiate Hockey Association (NCHA) following the loss. They will travel to face Concordia University Wisconsin in another NCHA doubleheader for their next games. The first comes on Friday, November 11 and is scheduled to start at 8:05 p.m. ET.