Part of Miami’s playbook for Saturday was a stronger start, two days after a weak period led to its first loss of the season.
That strategy was thwarted halfway through the first minute.
Robert Morris scored on the opening shift, taking a lead it would never relinquish, and the Colonials pumped in a pair of late empty-netters to take down the RedHawks, 4-1 at Clearview Arena and complete a home-and-home sweep.
It was Miami’s fifth straight loss vs. RMU and its second overall.
RECAP: Robert Morris (2-0) took the lead just 32 seconds in when Walter Zacher took a feed from Cameron Garvey at the left side of the net, skated across the top of the crease and shoved it into the net.
The Colonials extended the lead when Zacher put a point-blank shot on net, found the rebound in traffic and stuffed home a backhander with 6:55 left in the middle frame.
Miami (2-2-2) trimmed the lead to one 1:49 later, as Ryan Sullivan rammed home a rebound from the slot off a point shot by defenseman Michael Quinn.
But the RedHawks were unable to generate the equalizer, and RMU tacked on a pair of empty-netters to seal it.
STATS: Sullivan scored five goals last season, and this was already his second of 2024-25 and his sixth in his last 20 games.
Quinn picked up the primary assist — the third of the season for the freshman — with all of them coming on Saturday.
The other helper went to another freshman, Casper Nassen, who is now 2-3-5 with all of those points coming in the last five games.
It’s going to be fun to watch Quinn and Nassen continue to develop over the next few years for the RedHawks.
— Miami killed off all three Robert Morris penalties, including a major, and are now 23-for-24 on the PK (95.8 percent).
ANALYSIS: Thursday’s effort was clearly Miami’s worst of the early 2024-25 season, and all eyes were on the first period of this game.
It didn’t go well. The entire first half of the game didn’t go well.
The best news is that it finally got better, but by that point the RedHawks were chasing the game, and two empty-net goals distorted the final score.
Miami loitered in the offensive zone during multiple late shifts and put solid quality shots on net down the stretch, but that early deficit proved costly.
If you were hoping that the issues of Game 5 were a complete one-off and on Saturday we’d return to Miami 2024-25 Version Games 1-4, you had to be disappointed at this follow-up.
— Colby Ambrosio has been a stud early on, but this is the second time in three games he’s been assessed a boarding major, and this time it was accompanied by a game misconduct.
This can’t become a habit, as he’s too valuable to be in the dressing room. And it hasn’t been at all an issue in the past — in 138 previous college games he had never been assessed a major.
His 20 PIMs this season are already a career high for the fifth-year senior.
— Controversy!
Miami had a potential goal waved off, but there wasn’t a clear view of what happened. A backhand shot from the top of the crease got behind goalie Croix Kochendorfer, and based on the FloHockey angle it looked like it may have hit the post and kicked back under Kochendorfer.
RedHawks coach Anthony Noreen challenged but there was no conclusive evidence to overturn the non-goal call.
Then on Robert Morris’ second goal, scored on a scramble in front of the net, Tom Wilson set up camp deep in the crease, and from one camera angle it looked like Bruveris may have been obstructed from getting back into position. Even Robert Morris’ FloTV PxP guy said he thought it should’ve been waved off.
— The whole proverbial goalie getting into a team’s head cliche may have played a factor this weekend. Miami was limited to two goals in two games and seemed to hit every part of the posts over the course of the series. Puck luck was one of the things that conspired against the RedHawks in this series.
— Bruno Bruveris was back in net to start this game after he was 11-for-16 on Thursday and Ethan Dahlmeir stopped all eight shots he faced in relief.
But Bruveris responded. On the first goal he allowed, Zacher went in unabated, and Bruveris was left alone doing snow angels in his crease.
The second one was on a rebound scramble and he appeared a bit obstructed as he tried to recover from the initial shot.
Bruveris was excellent.
— We caught a glimpse of Noreen’s extra-attacker philosophy. Down one, he pulled Bruveris with just over two minutes remaining while Miami possessed the puck deep the offensive zone.
That’s more aggressive than Chris Bergeron but on par with the way with the game is played at this level in 2024.
Noreen went with six skaters again after the ENG, leading to another RMU freebie, but at that point it’s irrelevant whether a team loses by two or three.
LINEUP CHANGES: Senior defenseman Spencer Cox dressed for his 100th career game, replacing Michael Feenstra in the seventh spot, and he was fine in limited action.
Artur Turansky, who played in 67 of 72 games his first two seasons, was in the lineup for the first time this season, playing right wing on the fourth and replacing Tanyon Bajzer. Bajzer had played in four of the RedHawks’ first five games.
STANDINGS: Miami dropped to No. 26 in the way-to-early-to-care PairWise rankings.
FINAL THOUGHTS: Yeah, getting swept by Robert Morris is disappointing after the potential Miami showed the first two weeks.
And to be fair, Colonials coach Derek Schooley deserves a ton of credit for resurrecting the program and becoming competitive again this quickly.
They’ve had Miami’s number as far back as the second Frozen Four season in 2010.
Everyone knew this RedHawks Rebuild was going to take time, and of course that process would have its ups and downs.
Overall, we’ve seen way more positives than negatives through the first three weeks of Noreen’s first Division I season and are much better equipped to handle the eventual gauntlet of a schedule lying ahead.
But no one promised a smooth ride.
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