Box Score NORTHFIELD, Vt. – Pier-Olivier Cotnoir notched his second hat trick in as many weekends and Travis Janke had five primary assists as the two combined to lead the Norwich men's ice hockey team to a 6-3 over Tufts in the Cadets' regular season finale.
Norwich (17-5-3, 15-1-3 ECAC East) had already clinched its 13th straight ECAC East regular season title with Friday's 4-2 win over Conn. College. The Cadets extended their unbeaten streak however to nine straight games.
Tufts' Mike Vitale gave the Jumbos an early 1-0 lead when he capitalized on Norwich goaltender Alex Dubois misplaying the puck behind the back of the net at 8:11 mark of the first period with assists from Conor Pieri and Fredrik Mellgren.
Norwich's Scott Schroeder responded with his 15th goal of the season on a 5-on-3 power play at the 12:24 mark to level the score. Schroeder banged home a pass on the doorstep of the crease after a tic-tac-toe pass set up from Janke and Cotnoir.
Cotnoir tallied his first goal 3:56 later when he took a pass from Janke and beat Tufts' goaltender Brian Phillips short side to give the Cadets their first lead at 2-1.
However, Tufts (6-16-1, 5-14-0 NESCAC) came back 1:35 later to tie the game up again with a power play goal from Kyle Gallegos. Gallegos walked through the Norwich defense and then beat Dubois between his arm and body for his 15th goal of the season off assists from Tom Derosa and Jared Barker.
Francois Gatien gave Norwich the lead for good with a power play tally at the 11:50 mark of the second period. Gatien took a pass in the right face-off circle from Scott Schroeder who was behind the net. Gatien wristed the puck past Phillips to give NU a 3-2 lead with just one second remaining on the penalty to Gallegos for hooking.
Cotnoir added his second goal of the game at 14:13 mark of the second period with assists from Janke and Kyle Thomas.
Cotnoir picked up his third hat trick of the season and 17th goal at the 4:21 mark of the third period with an assist from Janke.
Tufts' Garrett Sider cut the deficit to 5-3 at the 14:40 mark off assists from Cody Armstrong and Zach Diaco.
Norwich capped the scoring with Kyle Thomas scoring his 13th goal of the season with assists from Janke and Cotnoir. Just moments earlier, Thomas had a penalty shot opportunity, but the puck rolled off his stick as he came in on Phillips.
Dubois made 13 saves in net for Norwich to improve to 8-5-1 in his first game action since Jan. 21 against Wesleyan.
Phillips made 27 saves for Tufts and dropped to 1-5 on the year.
Norwich was 2-for-5 on the power play, while Tufts was 1-for-3.
The Cadets return to action next Saturday at 7 p.m. when they begin defense on their ECAC East Tournament championship from a year ago. NU will face the University of New England in the ECAC East Quarterfinal round at Kreitzberg Arena.
Norwich beat UNE 8-0 in the very first game of the season on Nov. 19.
