(Photo Credit: Marina Williams/WCSN)
As one of the most iconic venues in American sports, the history that resides inside Herb Brooks Arena in Lake Placid, New York — the site of the 2023 Adirondack Winter Invitational — speaks for itself.
Added to the Lake Placid Olympic Center in 1979 to host the Winter Olympics a year later, the arena hosted the 1980 Winter Olympics and the renowned “Miracle on Ice”, when the United States hockey team upset the heavily-favored Soviet Union en route to its second gold medal in program history.
On Saturday night, No. 13 Arizona State men’s hockey (14-3-5) added its own chapter into the famous arena’s lore, erasing a two-goal deficit and defeating No. 17 Cornell (6-4-2) 3-2 in a shootout to claim the Adirondack Winter Invitational’s inaugural crown.
The victory wasn’t a miracle per se, as it will show up as a tie on the Sun Devils’ official record, but it does represent a feat the program hasn’t achieved since playing in the Ice Vegas Invitational in 2018: winning an in-season tournament.
“It’s obviously awesome to win,” graduate forward Brian Chambers said. “Especially when any championship is such a fun time, especially with this special group of guys. And to get the first trophy, we’re 1-for-1, [it] feels great.”
Similarly to Friday’s semi-final game against Clarkson, ASU found itself facing a two-goal deficit before the contest reached its halfway point. A normally tame Big Red power play — which entered Saturday with the 44th-best in the nation operating at a 16.3% success rate — caught fire early on, cashing in on its first opportunity of the evening.
When junior defenseman Ty Murchison took a tripping minor with over five minutes to play in the first, Cornell senior forward Gabriel Seger made him pay almost immediately. Right off the faceoff, the puck found the Sweden native’s stick in the slot, allowing him to pick his spot and beat junior netminder TJ Semptimphelter on his glove side. In only seven short seconds, the Big Red pulled ahead.
However, Cornell’s early success wasn’t due to a slow and sloppy start by the Sun Devils. Unlike in its previous game, ASU came out of the gate with physicality and dictated play from the get-go while remaining responsible in its own end. A big reason for this was the third forward line — consisting of freshman Kyle Smolen along with seniors Benji Eckerle and Ryan O’Reilly — setting the tone during the opening minutes of the game.
“I thought we came out fast,” Chambers said. “I remember [O’Reilly], Smolen and [Eckerle] had the first shift. They got it deep and worked it down low pretty hard. I thought we played very good, but they had a couple of power plays and they took advantage of it. On five-on-five I thought we were great.”
At first, though, ASU wasn’t rewarded for its improved play. Mere seconds after killing a tripping minor assessed to freshman forward Cole Gordon, the Sun Devils conceded a goal to freshman defenseman George Fegaras with under five minutes elapsed in the middle frame. This faced them with a multi-goal deficit with lots of game left to play, a situation they’ve become all too familiar with this season.
But it didn’t take long for ASU’s resilience to surface, only 17 seconds to be exact. Entering the offensive zone, freshman forward Tony Achille saw his space withering and dropped a pass back to senior defenseman Tim Lovell. Lovell then found junior forward Jackson Niedermayer streaking to the net, and the duo connected for a tip-in goal that gave Achille his first career point and provided the Sun Devils the jolt they needed.
“I’m really proud of the way our guys responded,” Semptimphelter said. “That’s been the story with this group, we’re a really resilient group. It just seems like there’s no mountain too high for us to climb, and I’m really proud of the way our guys responded.
“[We] obviously [gained] a lot of confidence out of Jackson Niedermayer, to go down and score and make it 2-1. That was a huge momentum swing for us…”
Whenever ASU pulls off a seemingly improbable come-from-behind victory, much of the credit goes to Semptimphelter’s heroics between the pipes. The Sun Devils did play a much cleaner game and avoided self-inflicted wounds, but Cornell certainly got its fair share of scoring chances, as it finished the game with a 27-20 advantage in shots on goal.
His two goals allowed aside, Semptimphelter was once again phenomenal in the crease, stopping 25 shots and helping his team survive multiple high-pressure situations. One of these instances came with six-and-a-half minutes left in the third period, with the Big Red peppering the junior with shots and remaining in the offensive zone for upwards of 30 seconds.
But this type of pressure — far from a novelty for the New Jersey native — is something Semptimphelter embraces, knowing he needs to compete at the highest level possible.
“That’s really all you can do in that [situation],” Semptimphelter said. “You just keep giving your team a chance to win, and that’s really all you can control.”
Thanks in large part to Semptimphelter’s heroics, ASU tied the game at two less than a minute into the third frame. On an abbreviated power play that carried over from the previous period, senior forward Matthew Kopperud potted a rebound for his nation-leading 10th power-play goal of the season, one that further cemented the Sun Devils’ belief that they would come out on top.
The scores in two of the tournament’s first three contests weren’t settled in a full 60 minutes, and the championship game was no different. Following a wild five-minute, 3-on-3 overtime period that saw good chances but no goals for either side, a shoutout was required to determine who would hoist the inaugural Adirondack Winter Invitational trophy.
Both goaltenders remained perfect in the shootout until the third and final round when Smolen beat Cornell junior netminder Ian Shane with a nifty and patient backhand-forehand deke. All that separated ASU from victory was a save from Semptimphelter, who turned aside the ensuing try to ice the game.
Despite the victory, Saturday won’t be the last time the Sun Devils face off against the Big Red, as the two teams will meet again on Jan. 12-13 for a weekend series in Tempe.
“Give them credit,” Semptimphelter said. “They’re a really good team… It’s good and we’re looking forward to playing those guys again in a few weeks.”
