Box Score BOSTON – Freshman forward Patrick Delvecchio (Missassauga, Ontario) scored the game-winning goal midway through the third period to lift the Norwich University men's ice hockey team to a massive 2-1 win over UMass Boston on Saturday afternoon at the Edward T. Barry Rink in New England Hockey Conference (NEHC) action.
Norwich (8-3-4, 5-3-3 NEHC) picked up a crucial six points on the weekend to complete the sweep after beating Johnson & Wales 6-2 on Friday night. With the win, the Cadets moved into a three-way tie for second place in the NEHC standings with Elmira and UMass Boston.
Senior defenseman Devon Becker (Langley, British Columbia) picked up his nation-leading 19th assist of the season after he fired the puck toward the net and then it deflected off Del Vecchio and into the back of the net for the goal that proved to be the difference midway through the second period.
Clark Kerner (Kansas City, Kan.) worked the puck out of the corner and fed it back to Becker to pick up the secondary assist on the goal as Norwich added another goal on to its nation leading power-play percentage.
Norwich opened the scoring just 2:52 into the first period with Brett Ouderkirk (Monkland, Ontario) scoring his ninth goal of the season off an assist from Isaac Chapman (Lower Sackville, Nova Scotia) and Beckerto take the early 1-0 lead.
UMass Boston (10-6-1, 6-3-1 NEHC) scored at the 7:37 mark of the second period to tie the game up with Michael Krupinski scoring off assists from Jeffrey Skinner and Ethan Nitkin.
Atherton made 38 saves for the Cadets to pick up the victory in goal. Sam Best made 29 saves in goal for UMass Boston to get saddled with the loss.
Norwich will travel to Middlebury on Tuesday, Jan. 18 to wrap-up its five-game road trip to open the 2022 portion of its schedule. Norwich finally returns home to Kreitzberg Arena to play its first game since Dec. 4 when it hosts Castleton at 7 p.m. on Jan. 21 and Skidmore at 4 p.m. on Jan. 22.
