Pittsburgh, Pa. -  Robert Morris University men's hockey battled through a hard-fought three-game series and into the quarterfinals of the Atlantic Hockey playoffs with a first round series win over Bentley University, with a decisive 3-2 win on Sunday night at Colonials Arena.

The Colonials opened the scoring 13:46 into the game as Michael Louria wrapped the puck around the Bentley cage and past Aidan Pelino, with Spencer Dorowicz and Brandon Watt earning assists on the tally.

RMU pulled ahead 2-0 on perhaps the highlight reel goal of the season. While on the penalty kill, Alex Bontje took the puck behind the net and passed around the boards to Luke Lynch who saw Alex Tonge further up the ice. Tonge took the puck and raced towards the goal, dangling the puck around Bentley's Alexey Solovyev, then pulling the puck backhand and shooting on the forehand past Pelino and bringing fans to their feet as the Colonials grabbed a 2-0 lead with 2:05 remaining in the first.

But before the Colonials could kill off the penalty, the Falcons struck back as Kyle Schmidt put the puck home to cut RMU's lead to one with 1:20 to play in the first.

Robert Morris found itself on the penalty kill again midway through the second, and the Falcons took advantage. Charlie Marchand scored his second of the weekend, tying the game 2-2 with Bentley's second power play goal of the night.

Nearly half of Bentley's total shots against RMU came while the Colonials were a man down. The Falcons were awarded seven power plays in the opening two periods, firing 14 of their 19 total shots while on the man-advantage. Bentley was 2-for-7 on the power play through two periods, while RMU was 0-for-2.

After breaking through for his first point in nine games, with a goal and assist in game two, Daniel Mantenuto was up to the task again in game three. Watt earned his second assist of the game, intercepting the puck from the Falcons and shooting it off the pads of Pelino and over to the sophomore Mantenuto, who tapped the loose puck home and gave the Colonials a 3-2 lead with 4:42 remaining in the second.

Despite finally earning two power plays in the third period, it was Bentley who brought the shots, firing everything they had at goaltender Francis Marotte, who made save after save, highlighted by a pad save to perhaps save the game as the Falcons' Schmidt nearly put home his second of the game, before Marotte slid his pad across to his right, stoning Schmidt's opportunity with less than three minutes to play.

"It was definitely a grind but we just had to use our speed, get pucks deep and try to beat their defensemen to pucks and when we did, we just hemmed them in and created chances," Mantenuto said, scoring in his second consecutive game. "It was a big win for us, a good confidence booster."



Robert Morris held on for the win to advance to the quarterfinals and will face Holy Cross, after a first round upset of No. 6 RIT by No. 11 Sacred Heart, sends the seven-seed Colonials to visit the three-seed Crusaders, for a best-of-three series beginning Friday, March 9 at 7:05 p.m. in Worcester, Mass.


COLONIALS MEN'S HOCKEY ON SOCIAL MEDIA
Facebook  |  Twitter  |  Instagram  |  Snapchat  |  YouTube

-