RUTLAND, Vt. – Sophomore forward Anthony Flaherty (South Boston, Mass.) scored his first collegiate hat trick to lift the No. 2-nationally ranked Norwich University men's ice hockey team to a 5-1 win over Castleton on Friday night in the Battle of Vermont rivalry game at Spartan Arena.

Fellow sophomore William Pelletier (St. Jean Chrysostome, Quebec) scored twice as well to round out the Norwich scoring on the night as the Cadets (9-0-1, 7-0-0 ECAC East) completed their first semester schedule unbeaten. Pelletier has scored four goals and tallied three assists for seven points in just four games after missing the first six due to an injury.

Sophomore goalie Ty Reichenbach (Billings, Mont.) made 24 saves to improve to 4-0-1 on the season.

Pelletier scored with just 12 seconds left in the first period off assists from Kevin Salvucci (Plymouth, Mass.) and Dean Niezgoda (Brewster, Mass.) to give Norwich a 1-0 lead entering the first intermission.

Flaherty scored the eventual game-winning goal at the 8:37 mark of the second period off assists from Gerard McEleney (Canton, Mass.) and Alec Thieda (Rochester Hills, Mich.) to increase the lead to 2-0.

Castleton cut into Norwich's lead just 2:22 into the third period when Braeden Moffatt finally solved Reichenbach off a feed from Ryan Smith.

However, that's as close as the Spartans would get as Norwich scored three unanswered goals to close out the game and pull away from its instate rivals.

Flaherty notched his second of the game at the 4:38 mark off assists from Nevin Lawler (Fitchburg, Mass.) and Niezgoda.

Pelletier made it 4-1 at the 6:10 mark with a nifty breakaway move, faking the goalie out and then flipping the puck in on his backhand for an unassisted goal.

Flaherty capped the scoring and his hat trick with 17 seconds left in the game with a power play goal off assists from McEleney and Lawler.

Ryan Mulder made 37 saves for Castleton as the Spartans fell to 3-8-0 overall and 3-5 in ECAC East play. The loss marked Castleton's sixth straight defeat.

Norwich is now 10-0-1 against Castleton in its last 11 meetings and 16-4-1 overall against the Spartans.

Norwich will open the 2015 portion of its schedule by hosting the annual Northfield Savings Bank Holiday Tournament on Jan. 2 and 3. The Cadets will face Colby in the first round while Buffalo State will take on Neumann in the other semifinal. The winners will meet on Saturday in the championship at 7 p.m., while the losers play at 4 p.m. in the consolation.   

-CADETS-