Rutland, VT - New England College staved off three-consecutive Castleton power plays late in the third period to force overtime where in which both teams went scoreless tying, 2-2, at Spartan Arena in front of 600 fans in Eastern Collegiate Athletic Conference (ECAC) East Men's hockey action.
Stuart Stefan (Delhi, Ont.) opened the scoring for Castleton at 13:19 sniping a wrister past Pilgrims' goaltender Aaron Harvey (Milford, N.S.). From the right face-off circle, Tyler Atkins (Brockville, Ont.) made a tape-to-tape pass across ice to the left face-off circle and Stefan finished top left corner for his second goal of the season.
In the second period, New England College responded scoring two unanswered goals each coming off of power play situations.
Directly in front of the blueline, Aki Uola (Turku, Finland) unleashed a whistling wrist-shot that was redirected into the net by Jeff Armando (Canton, MA) - his third goal of the season - past Castleton goaltender Seth McNary (Woburn, MA) at 4:14.
Alex Muse (Lynnfield, MA) gave the Pilgrims a 2-1 lead sniping a shot through McNary's five-hole from the right face-off circle at 9:35.
Castleton found the equalizer at 13:35 from Omar Pacha's (Boucherville, Que.) stick. Harvey stopped Cody Ayers (Colorado Springs, CO) initial shot but Pacha slipped home the rebound to tie the game at 2-2 for his first goal of the season.
Both teams went scoreless in the third period with the Spartans applying most of the offensive pressure taking 11 shots on net and the Pilgrims firing off five shots.
McNary finished the contest with 27 saves while Harvey stopped 31 shots on net.
Castleton returns to action at home on November 28th and 29th for the Rutland Herald Invitational with a start time schedule for Friday against Becker College at 6 p.m. New England College travels to Southern Maine for a 7 p.m. ECAC East face-off.