COLORADO COLLEGE — Colorado College scored early, but didn’t score often enough Saturday as the Tigers fell to 16th-ranked Omaha, 3-2, at Robson Arena.
CC had a chance to move into sole possession of the sixth place in the NCHC but produced just three shots on three power-play opportunities and Omaha grabbed the sixth-place spot with its sixth league win.
Hunter McKown put the Tigers (7-14-3, 4-9-1 NCHC) on the board just 1:17 into the contest. Jackson Jutting fed Connor Mayer for a shot from the top of the left circle. Omaha goalie Isaiah Saville made the save but McKown cleaned up the rebound in the crease for his team-high eighth goal of the season.
The Mavericks (16-10-0, 6-8-0 NCHC) evened things up when Brannon McManus fired a shot from the left circle that went above CC goalie Matt Vernon’s left shoulder and into the top right corner at the 12:06 mark of the opening frame.
Kirby Proctor put Omaha ahead for the first time at the 8:05 mark of the second period. Proctor took a cross-ice pass from Tyler Weiss (2 assists) and blasted a shot past Vernon. Colorado College had a couple of power-play chances later in the period, but only put one shot on Saville.
Another man advantage for the home team went by the wayside early in the third period. However, Mayer put some life back in Robson Arena with his first goal of the season at the 8:50 mark of the third. Stanley Cooley fed Mayer from behind the net and he cleanly beat Saville from the left circle to even the score at 2-2.
The draw was short-lived as Matt Miller scored the game-winner less than two minutes later when he beat a CC defender to the front of the net and put the puck past Vernon.
“We played 20 minutes of a 60-minute hockey game tonight,” head coach Kris Mayotte said. “We didn’t manage pucks and weren’t willing to do the hard things. I thought we had a good response in the third, we tie it up but then give one up, and that kind of deflated the bench.”
The Tigers did not commit a penalty for the first time this season, but the power play struggled all night.
“Everything,” Mayotte said when asked what needed to improve on the power play.
Omaha outshot the Tigers for the second straight night, this time by a 30-25 margin. Vernon finished with 27 saves, while Saville had 23.
Colorado College stays at home and will host No. 3 Western Michigan next weekend, Feb. 4-5. That series was rescheduled from Jan. 14-15, when the games were postponed due to COVID-19 issues.
