Senior forward Reed Lebster scored two goals for the Minutemen
Massachusetts Edges Providence, 3-2
Senior forward Reed Lebster scored two goals for the Minutemen

Box Score - Highlights

PROVIDENCE - University of Massachusetts hockey had a pair of seniors provide all the scoring to help lift the team to a 3-2 win on the road at Providence on Friday night. The win moves the Minutemen to 10-13-3 overall, 4-11-1 in Hockey East, while the Friars drop to 12-10-6 and 7-6-5 in league action.

"I'm happy for the guys to get rewarded," said UMass head coach Greg Carvel. "I think we've played well on the road the past couple games and deserved better. We've been talking about it that we're not that far off from flipping things. We called tonight a flip game and the guys played well enough. That goal in the third period was huge. We had seniors score, which is what we've been missing and we've continued to play pretty good defensive hockey. I know we gave up a lot of shots, but I don't feel like we gave up a lot of chances. We've got to build off this now. We get to go home now for two games and we needed this to feel good about ourselves and they earned it tonight."

UMass opened the scoring on the power play 5:30 into the first period. Sophomore Ryan Ufko fed Kenny Connors in the right faceoff circle from the blueline. Connors' shot was stopped by goaltender Philip Svedeback, but senior Reed Lebster was there in the slot to knock in the rebound.

Lebster struck again before the intermission as senior Cal Kiefiuk played the puck off the boards back to him and the Grand Rapids, Michigan native fired home a quick wrister at 17:03 for his second of the night.

Providence appeared to have halved their deficit on the power play in the closing minutes of the first, but the goal was overturned for offsides upon a successful challenge by the Minutemen.

The Friars would eventually get on the board at the 4:24 mark of the second period as Brett Berard deposited a puck into the top right corner of the UMass net off a pass from Connor Kelley and Guillaume Richard.

Providence tied the score at 2-2, 4:23 into the third with Parker Ford scoring on the rush with Nick Poisson and Will Schimek picking up the assists.

Kiefiuk came through with the game winner at the 11:57 mark, redirecting in Scot Morrow's shot from the left point. Ufko earned the secondary for his second helper of the night.

The Friars out-shot the Minutemen 45-20 in the contest, while UMass was 1-for-3 on the power play and 1-for-1 on the penalty kill.

Sophomore Luke Pavicich totaled 43 saves in net for Massachusetts and Svedeback turned aside 17 for Providence.

UMass will be back in action next Friday, February 10, when the squad will open a two-game set against Vermont at the Mullins Center at 7 p.m.