The 1920s may be long gone, but the Lost Weekend is back. The Dartmouth men's hockey team just lived through it in upstate New York.
The Big Green (3-15-1, 2-11-1) lost Eastern Collegiate Athletic Conference road match-ups to Colgate, 9-3, on Friday and to Cornell, 7-1, on Saturday.
Dartmouth displayed several, but alas far too few, bright spots. Mike Stacchi '95, leading scorer Dion Del Monte '95 and Captain Mike Loga '94 all tallied against the Red Raiders (11-8-2, 8-3-2), and top goal scorer Scott Fraser '94 netted the Big Green's only goal against the Big Red (4-10-5, 4-5-5).
Del Monte contributed on every score in the Colgate contest. The junior center assisted on the two goals against Colgate. Stacchi and Fraser also each added assists over the weekend.
Failed scoring opportunities on power plays proved a particular problem for Dartmouth. The Big Green converted on only one of ten of its man-advantage situations Friday night. It followed that with an 0-for-8 effort against Cornell.
"We did some things we normally don't do on the power play. It all went downhill from there," Del Monte lamented.
The Big Green also suffered from low goal to save ratios compared to its opponents. "We weren't getting a lot of breaks around the net. We started to get a little frustrated," Del Monte said.
While Colgate converted on 9 shots against Mike Bracco '94 (who made 25 saves) Dartmouth could manage only 3 scores versus a similar 23 Red Raider stops.
Green coach Roger Demment tried a different approach versus the Big Red, using Ben Heller '97 in goal. The result, however, was largely the same. Heller stopped 26 shots but let 7 between the pipes while Cornell goalie Ed Skazyk, the conference's save percentage leader, made a comparable 25 saves, but only allowed Dartmouth one goal.
Dartmouth faded in each contest. The Big Green managed 2-2 and 1-1 deadlocks at the end of each first period. Colgate and Cornell, however, subsequently ran off 7-1 and 6-0 margins respectively over the final two periods. "We started out strong; then things started to unravel. It was a matter of us not playing for the full 60 minutes," Del Monte said.
As the Green floundered, the Raiders and Big Red flourished. With his first ever hat trick, Colgate's freshman right wing Mike Harder garnered ECAC Rookie of the Week honors. True to his status as the league's co-leader in scoring, Raider senior center Bruce Gardiner added two goals and two assists in the match-up.
Freshman center Vinnie Auger paced Cornell with two scores. The Big Red's co-top goal scorers, senior right wing Geoff Bumstead and sophomore left wing Mike Sancimino, each notched a goal and an assist against Dartmouth.
Despite these feats, Del Monte stated, "I don't think in either case the other team is six or seven goals better than us."
Nevertheless, Del Monte admitted, "The season hasn't gone as we hoped or wanted. We need to concentrate on making the game fun again."
Simply put, Dartmouth wants to avoid another Lost Weekend.
