Box score
KALAMAZOO, Mich. -- After jumping out to an early 2-0 lead, Western Michigan's men's hockey team gave up four unanswered goals to fall to the University of Nebraska-Omaha Mavericks, 4-2, in front of 1,697 fans at Lawson Arena on Sunday afternoon.
Western Michigan (6-13-1, 2-10-0 CCHA) scored first at the 8:14 mark when junior right winger Patrick Galivan scored on a pass from Max Campbell to beat UNO (9-10-3, 6-7-3 CCHA) goalie Jerad Kaufman for his sixth goal on the season. Campbell earned his 10th helper on Galivan's first goal. Just 35-seconds later the Broncos extended their lead to 2-0 when junior captain Chris Frank passed the puck to junior captain Jeff LoVecchio who skated down the far end of the ice on a three-on-one break for the Broncos. LoVecchio found a waiting Galivan who went top shelf to beat Kaufman and pick up his second goal of the game and seventh on the season. Frank picked up his fourth assist of the year while LoVecchio added his sixth. WMU outshot UNO 10-6 in the first period and went into the break with a 2-0 lead.
"I thought we played extremely hard," said head coach Jim Culhane. "Nice goals by Galivan and couple of nice passes by Campbell and LoVecchio. They just got the momentum back on the power play in the second."
The second period was a different story as UNO went 2-4 on the power play to tie up the game. The first came from a hooking call on LoVecchio. Bryan Marshall passed the puck to Juha Uotila who sent it to Mick Lawrence. Lawrence wound up and fired a slap shot to beat freshman goaltender Jerry Kuhn for his 12th goal of the year. Uotila picked up his fifth assist on the season and Marshall added his 22nd. UNO struck again on another power play later in the period and it was Lawrence again who lit the lamp for the Mavericks. This time it was on feeds from Dan Charleston and Ed Del Grosso, who picked up their 12th and eight assists on the season respectively. The game tying goal was the 13th this campaign for Lawrence. The Broncos and Mavericks headed into the period break knotted at 2.
The game-winning goal came midway through the third period. Marshall passed the puck through center ice to a streaking Brandon Scero. Scero had a breakaway and fired the puck past Kuhn to push the Mavericks ahead, 3-2. Scero picked up his ninth goal of the season and Marshall added his 23rd helper and third in two games against the Broncos.
Western Michigan had a great scoring chance just minutes later during a power play. Sophomore defenseman Tyler Ludwig passed the puck to Campbell who fired a one-timer that clanged off the upper left corner of the post. Kaufman was able to smother the rebound to kill the scoring chance. UNO's Thomas Klempa added an empty-netter with three seconds remaining to ice the game, 4-2.
"I"m extremely disappointed. It is not the outcome that anyone associated with our program wanted," said Culhane. "Dropping two games at home to Nebraska-Omaha. Give full credit to UNO, they played a very good game last night and executed very well on the power play."
The Broncos now head to Ann Arbor to take on CCHA rival University of Michigan on Friday, Jan. 11at 7:35 p.m., then host the Wolverines the following night at 8:05 p.m.
