Photo courtesy of Art Chill
The Ramapo College ice hockey club team fell short of Seton Hall University 3-2, when the two teams met on Nov. 20 at Sport-O-Rama in Monsey, New York. After being down 2-0 in the first period, the Roadrunners fought back to force overtime, but fell just short.
Seton Hall opened the scoring up 10 minutes and 33 seconds into the game, when right wing Steven Cotroneo found the back of the net off of the feed from Alexander Rudolph. Just about one minute later, PJ Carfagno was able to extend the lead to 2-0 for Seton Hall with an unassisted goal.
“We were with them in the beginning even when they scored two goals. It took the wind out of our sails, but we still stayed right with them,” said the Roadrunners’ general manager Art Chill.
Stay right with them they did, as they were able to cut the lead in half by scoring with 59 seconds left in the second period, when freshman forward Patrick Anzano netted his third goal of the season.
Ramapo kept the pressure on as the third period began and, just 31 seconds into the third, sophomore defenseman and one of the captains Matthew Rose was able to tie the game up.
“We were breaking out and catching them flat-footed on the blue line,” explained Chill. “We dominated the third period and their goalie came up with some big saves, some of them I was wondering how he even stopped them.”
Not only was the Ramapo attack getting pressure, their goaltender, sophomore Keith Gay, was pretty amazing himself. He kept them in the game, finishing with an incredible 51 saves on 54 shots.
“This has been the entire season. He comes up big when he has to. He is a gifted goaltender and, to be very honest, we wouldn’t have had the successes we’ve had this season without him keeping us in the game,” said Chill of his goaltender’s spectacular play.
The game remained tied for the rest of the third period, forcing the game into overtime. Seton Hall was able to score the winner just one minute 46 seconds into the overtime period after an unassisted goal from Bryan Nagy.
Seton Hall is a division two club team, while Ramapo is division three, and this was not a league game. The Roadrunners have eight games remaining and seven of those are in the league. Their playoff chances are slowly slipping, but there is still time to make a run and get into the postseason.
“The loss to Yale was huge because it was a four-point game and could have solidified our playoff hopes. The loss puts us behind the eight ball and we’re now chasing other teams. We need some help from other teams knocking each other off and we have to run the table. It’s up to us now to take charge of our destiny,” said Chill.
Ramapo returns to action with back-to-back league games against King’s Point, the first of which is on the road, Saturday, Dec. 5. Then, they return home to host King’s Point on Sunday, Dec. 6.
rrinsky@ramapo.edu
