Box score

Postgame comments (Jim Madigan - YouTube.com)

The Northeastern men's hockey team displayed its versatility on Saturday night, grinding out a much closer victory than Friday's series opener, sweeping Vermont via 4-2 victory at Gutterson Fieldhouse.

With the triumph, Northeastern pulled into a seventh-place tie with Massachusetts in the Hockey East playoff race after both New Hampshire and the Minutemen lost on Saturday evening.

The Huskies used four different goal scorers in juniors Robbie Vrolyk and Alex Tuckerman, rookie Dan Cornell and sophomore Cody Ferriero to keep a frisky Catamount club at bay.

Senior captain Mike McLaughlin centered a third line with Vrolyk and Tuckerman that accounted for two goals and five assists in the triumph as the veteran registered Northeastern's second-consecutive playmaker (three assists) in as many games.

Junior goaltender Chris Rawlings was the anchor once again for the Huskies' defensive corps, turning aside 23-of-25 UVM attempts. Vermont goaltender Alex Vazzano earned a rare start and slipped to 1-3-0 on the season with 24 stops. Rawlings is back to .500 on the year with a 10-10-3 record.

Northeastern's power play unit, which erupted for three goals on Friday night, was not allowed to flash its skill as the Huskies had only one power play opportunity on the evening. Northeastern's penalty-killing unit stopped three of UVM's four power play opportunities.

Northeastern's offense generated the first chance at 2:30 of the first period when freshman Joseph Manno ripped a wide-open shot from the slot. Vazzano made the initial save and the puck fortuitously bounced out to junior Justin Daniels for the rebound, but Vazzano made a quick adjustment and made a kick save with his right pad to deny the Huskies the early lead.

Northeastern's  transition game beat Vazzano a few minutes later, though, as Vrolyk tallied the first goal of the game at 6:56 of the opening stanza. Tuckerman cleared the puck out of NU's zone out to McLaughlin on the red line. McLaughlin took off down the middle and carved through a couple Catamounts and discharged a shot on Vazzano in close. Vazzano robbed McLaughlin with the glove, but he could not hold on and the disc came loose out to Vrolyk on the far post. Vrolyk put the loose puck to the back of the net to give Northeastern the 1-0 advantage.

Vermont picked up the tempo and possessed in the Huskies' end the next few minutes and finally knotted the game up, 1-1, at 10:01 of the first period. Nick Bruneteau accepted a pass from Drew MacKenzie along the near boards and Bruneteau discovered an open lane to the crease. Bruneteau threw the puck towards the goalmouth and Kyle Reynolds had his stick perfectly positioned to tip it by Rawlings to draw even.

After the game went to 4-on-4 at the 10:58 mark, junior Garrett Vermeersch was assessed a high-sticking call at 11:55 to give UVM a 4-on-3 advantage for 1:03. Vermont cycled well and let a flurry of shots lose from outside the circles, hoping to pounce on a rebound in front of the net, but Rawlings gobbled all those shots up to keep it a 1-1 affair through the first period.

The second period opened with some fast-paced up and down action the sheet, but it was Northeastern that capitalized after gaining a faceoff to Vazzano's left.

McLaughlin cleanly won the draw out to Vrolyk who slipped past his defender on the set play. Vrolyk pulled the trigger in close and bounced the puck off of Vazzano's shoulder. Tuckerman came swooping in from the wing and sniffed out the loose rebound to pound it home past Vazzanio's glove at the 5:38 mark of the second period to reclaim the lead, 2-1.

The ice tipped towards UVM's territory and the Huskies dominated the time of possession for the duration of the next five minutes of play. After pummeling Vazzano with rubber, Cornell managed to find the back of the net in an attempt to pick up a redirection.

Sophomore Anthony Bitetto and Vermeersch worked the puck up to Cornell on the point. Cornell tried to throw the puck off of Vermeersch's stick who was clogged up in traffic, but instead of hitting anybody in the zone, the puck flew from beyond the blue line to the back of the net, just inches from the right pipe, to give Northeastern its first two-goal lead of the game at 10:13.

Freshman Adam Reid took a tripping call at 18:24 after getting overly aggressive on the forecheck and then sophomore Braden Pimm followed him to the penalty box with just 2.5 seconds remaining in the second session. Pimm's infraction was more lengthy than Reid's, taking a five-minute major for kneeing (19:57) to give Vermont a 5-on-3 advantage for 24 seconds to initiate the third stanza.

Despite the sizable advantage for UVM, Northeastern's penalty kill staved off the five-minute window to perfection, clogging the middle and forcing shots to the outside. Vermont did not pose a real through during the major penalty power play.

A 4-on-4 opportunity presented itself at 6:43 of the third period, but neither team offered any formidable chances with the extra real estate.

The Catamounts sent a final jolt to Northeastern's bench after Ferriero sat for a slash at 16:47 of the third period and the UVM power play unit inched to within a goal at the 18:00-minute mark.

Matt White sent the puck in from the top of the zone, but Rawlings made the initial stop. The puck bounced back into a huge scrum and Colin Markison was in the right place at the right time to dump in the carom to make it 3-2.

UVM head coach Kevin Sneddon pulled Vazzano for the extra attacker with about 1:20 to go in regulation, but Ferriero was able to beat the pressure and seal the weekend sweep with the empty-net goal at 19:41, solidifying the 4-2 victory.

Northeastern will play just one Hockey East game next weekend in preparation for the 60th annual Beanpot Tournament. The Huskies welcome in Massachusetts to close out the regular season on Friday, Feb. 3 at Matthews Arena for a 7:00 p.m. puck drop.

Game Notes
• Northeastern matched a program-best with its fourth-consecutive victory against Vermont on Jan. 28. The Huskies have defeated the Catamounts in four-straight outings only one other time in the 49-game series history. The last time spanned from Dec. 13, 1980 to Jan. 18, 1984.

• Northeastern's win on Saturday night at Vermont marked the Huskies' first conference sweep of an opponent this season. Northeastern also defeated Providence and UVM on consecutive nights back on Nov. 18-19, but it was NU's first consecutive victories over a league foe. Northeastern's longest winning spell over a Hockey East foe is now against Vermont (4-0-0). Providence is second, having been unbeaten in three games against the Friars (2-0-1).

• Mike McLaughlin skated in his 113th-career contest on Jan. 28 and within that span, he'd never tallied two assists in one game. At Vermont on Saturday, he registered three. McLaughlin followed up Braden Pimm's act from Friday night as both skaters registered a playmaker in consecutive outings at Gutterson Fieldhouse. For McLaughlin, the three-point performance counted as the first of his career. It was his second multi-point outing of the season and seventh of his career.

• Alex Tuckerman logged his first multi-point outing on Jan. 28 at Vermont with a goal and an assist since his overtime heroics on March 15, 2009 in the Hockey East quarterfinals against Massachusetts. Tuckerman sent the Huskies to the Hockey East semifinals with an overtime goal along with a tally in regulation. It marks Tuckerman's fifth-career multi-point game.

• Robbie Vrolyk scored his first goal of the season and first since netting one at Boston College on Feb. 18, 2011. The goal curbed a 31-game goal scoring draught for the Boylston, Mass. native. Vrolyk also added an assist, marking his second career multi-point game and first since a pair of goals at UMass on Feb. 13, 2010.

• Rookie Dan Cornell's goal on Saturday in Burlington counted as his second game-winning goal of the season. The Abington, Mass. native's first-career game-winning goal came against Notre Dame in the 9-2 victory on Dec. 2.

• Garrett Vermeersch has scored at least one point in 11 of his last 13 games, accounting for 14 points within that spell (6-8-14). He is riding a three-game point streak into the Massachusetts game.

• Along with Vermeersch's point streak, Anthony Bitetto, Braden Pimm, Mike McLaughin and Cody Ferriero are also riding point streaks. Pimm is on a three-game streak (1-4-5), while Bitetto (0-2-2), McLaughlin (1-3-4) and Ferriero (4-1-5) are all on two-game spurts.