BRUNSWICK, Maine - Rick Cleaver scored two goals, and four other Cadets lit the lamp as the sixth-ranked Norwich University men's ice hockey team defeated No. 11 Bowdoin, 6-4, Saturday afternoon in the team's regular season finale.

Bowdoin (17-6-0, 13-6-0 NESCAC) jumped out to an early 1-0 advantage as Matt Smith scored at the 8:35 mark of the first period.

Norwich (19-6-0, 15-4-0 ECAC East) bounced back with three unanswered goals to end the opening stanza. Eric Tallent got the Cadets going just 28 seconds after the Polar Bears scored, knotting the score at 1-1 at the 9:03 mark with his third goal of the season.

Cleaver added his first marker of the game on a five-on-five situation at 13:50 of the first. Craig Serino made it 3-1 in favor of the Cadets moments later when he scored a power play goal at the 14:58 mark. Serino's goal, his third of the year, came off an assist from Nikita Kashirsky.

The Cadets outshot the Polar Bears 14-8 in the first period, and they carried their 3-1 lead into the second.  

Bowdoin pulled to within midway through the second when Ryan Leary netted a power play goal at the 11:41 mark to make the score 3-2.

Cleaver restored Norwich's two-goal lead at the 15:15 mark of the second period when he scored his team-leading 26th goal of the season.

Bowdoin responded just 1:02 later when Colin McCormick scored a short-handed goal at the 16:17 mark to pull the Polar Bears to within 4-3 as the game went into the final 20 minutes.

Bowdoin turned up the pressure in the third period, but it was Norwich that broke through when Kashirsky tallied a short-handed goal of his own with just 3:13 to play.

Chad Anderson added an empty-net goal, his seventh of the season, at 19:59 of the third to close out the scoring.

Chance Gieni made 28 saves in the Norwich net to earn the victory for the Cadets. Chris Rossi stopped 31 shots for Bowdoin in the losing effort.

Norwich outshot Bowdoin, 37-32. The Cadets were 1-for-5 on the power play, while the Polar Bears went 1-for-8 on the man-advantage.

Norwich will be the No. 1 seed in the upcoming ECAC East Tournament, and the Cadets will host eighth-seeded Skidmore on Saturday, March 1, at 7 p.m. The game can be heard on the radio (WDEV: AM-550, FM-96.1), and on the internet (http://www.cadetsradio.com/).