LOWELL, Mass. - The UMass Lowell Hockey team was defeated by ECAC foe Rensselaer, 2-1 on Friday afternoon at the Tsongas Center in non-conference play.

The River Hawks drop to a 6-6-1 record, while RPI improves to 4-6-0 overall with the victory.

"I thought our guys didn't come out with enough urgency, I thought we got better as the game went along," said UMass Lowell Head Coach Norm Bazin. "We couldn't convert on our special teams and that was the dagger tonight."

Jakub Lacka put the Engineers in the lead at 2-1 with 11:27 to go in the third period on a power play tally to seal the win.

Freshman blueliner Jon McDonald (Livonia, Mich.) notched his first career goal with a wrist shot from the bottom of the left faceoff circle to tie the game at 1-1 for the River Hawks just two minutes into the second period.

Junior netminder Tyler Wall (Leamington, Ont.) made a couple of highlight reel saves in the first few minutes of the second period.

RPI's Will O'Reilly opened the scoring in the game at 8:09 of the opening period with a wrist shot from the right point. The River Hawks held the slight advantage in shots on goal at 8-7 in the first frame.

Wall made his ninth start of the season for the River Hawks, posting 21 saves in the losing effort, which included 11 saves in the middle stanza. RPI's Owen Savory totaled 26 stops in his first career start for the Engineers

Junior co-captain Ryan Lohin (Chadds Ford, Pa.) notched a game-high six shots on goal for the River Hawks. Freshman forward Lucas Condotta (Georgetown, Ont.) recorded a team-high 11 face-off victories (69%) for UMass Lowell.

UMass Lowell returns to action in the series finale at Rensselaer on Sunday, November 25th. Game time from Houston Fieldhouse in Troy, N.Y. is 4 p.m.