The University of Denver Pioneers (10-4-4, 5-3-2-1) fell, 5-4, to the Dartmouth College Big Green (3-8-1, 2-4-1) on Saturday at Magness Arena.
“It’s hard to always do things the right way, especially when you want it to be easy” Denver coach Jim Montgomery said. “We have too many of us that want it to be easy.”
Kohen Olischefski opened the scoring for the Pioneers on the power play midway through the opening period. The freshman notched his first collegiate goal after catching a pass from Blake Hillman and blasting a shot through the legs of Devin Buffalo to make it 1-0.
Denver continued its success on the power play at 14:24 of the first period when a tape-to-tape rink-wide pass from Henrik Borgström to Troy Terry set up the second goal of the night. Less than four (4) minutes after making it 2-0, Denver extended its lead with Olischefki’s second of the game to make it 3-0 at the first intermission.
Dartmouth returned from the first break with a pair of goals to kickstart the second period. Cam Strong made it 3-1 at 3:06 of the second period, then one (1) minute later the puck pinballed around Denver’s crease and found its way to the back of the net to make it a 3-2 game. The Big Green would add another goal before the close of the second period to make it 3-3 at the second intermission.
Collin Rutherford scored the go-ahead goal for the Big Green at 18:23 of the third period, then Shane Sellar added an empty netter shortly after to secure the victory. Denver’s Jack Doremus scored his first NCAA goal with 27 seconds remaining, but the goal was not enough to overcome the deficit.
“People have to come back, everybody involved in the program, to see if we’re committed to playing the right way because we don’t play the right way,” Montgomery said. “It’s really embarrassing.”
Tanner Jaillet finished with 23 saves. The Pioneers finished 2/4 on the power play and 2/2 on the penalty kill.
