FINAL SCORE: UMass Lowell 2, Vermont 0
LOWELL, Mass. – After scoring five goals in last night's game, the Vermont Catamounts could not find the back of the net as the UMass Lowell River Hawks took a 2-0 win on Saturday at Tsongas Arena.
 
UMass Lowell has now won five straight games and improves to 13-8-1 overall (7-4-1 HEA) while Vermont drops to 8-13-1 overall (1-10-1 HEA).
 
RELATED LINKS
Box Score
 
COACH'S QUOTE
"We lost the first period. They jumped on us hard and we gave them two easy goals," head coach Kevin Sneddon said. "We bounced back, had a good second by outplaying them. The third, we had to chase. Lowell played the 2-0 lead very well in the last eight minutes."
 
HOW IT HAPPENED

• In a hectic first period for the Catamounts, Stefanos Lekkas (30 saves) made a stellar kick save from his stomach at 6:28 of the period to keep the game scoreless.
• Halfway through the opening period, the River Hawks struck twice as Ryan Dmowski outmuscled a Catamount defender in the slot to deflect a centering pass home at 10:21 of the period. Just over two minutes later, Mattis Goransson fired a snapshot past Lekkas from the left offensive circle as he streaked in from the blue line to double the UML lead.
• Late in the first, Goransson exited the penalty box to a breakaway on Lekkas. Freshman Dallas Comeau chased him down and prevented a clean chance, but UML was awarded a penalty shot. Gonarsson came down and Lekkas and tried to fire a shot from the slot past the junior, whose blocker punched the shot out of the air.
• Vermont's best chances of the game came late in the second period. Alex Esposito cut to the slot from behind the net and found Vlad Dzhioshvili on the backdoor, but UML goalie Tyler Wall made a spectacular save to keep the Cats off the board. Minutes later, Matt O'Donnell fired a shot off the post with 52 seconds left in the frame.
• UVM made its final push in the third period, but could not put one past Tyler Wall, who posted a 25-save shutout in his first action in nearly three weeks.

UP NEXT
Vermont hosts Merrimack next weekend at Gutterson Fieldhouse for a pair of Hockey East games on Friday (Jan. 25) and Saturday (Jan. 26). Both games are slated for a 7:05 p.m. puck drop.
 
Vermont Men's Hockey Alumni are invited back to campus next weekend for the pair of Hockey East games, an alumni game and luncheon, and a post-game alumni reception.  Alumni are asked to register at go.uvm.edu/mihalum19 by Tuesday, January 22.  For more information, please contact our Victory Club Office by calling 802-656-0956 or emailing Victory.Club@uvm.edu.
 
Handy Toyota is the presenting sponsor of the 2018-19 men's hockey season