Koehler leads Lowell over Amherst. The Riverhawks started the season off in familiar style, taking a 6-4 victory over HockeyEast rival UMass-Amherst as well as a one game lead in the Alumni Cup series between the two teams. Lowell sophomore Greg Koehler had a hat trick including the game winner on a power-play in the second period. Senior Martin Fillion backstopped the Riverhawks with a strong 12-save performance in the third period and 19 saves overall. This is the third time in the last four seasons that Lowell has opened the year with a victory over the Minutemen. However, Lowell coach Tim Whitehead knows that Amherst has won the Alumni Cup the last two years and has vowed to dethrone the Cup champion team from Amherst. Amherst held a two goal lead at one point in the first period, but Lowell scored four unanswered goals to take a 5-3 lead into the third period. By the end of the second period, Lowell was outshooting Amherst 25-10 and Minuteman goalie Brian Regan looked strong despite being beaten five times. Three of those goals were on the Lowell powerplay including Koehler's game winner which came at 15:19 of the second period. Lowell was showing a strong power-play throughout the game with their defensemen displaying great compsure on the point, especially senior captain Mike Nicholishen. Koehler's goal came when senior defenseman Chris Libett slapped his stick on the ice, calling for the puck from Koehler, who fed the cross-ice pass to the pointman. Libett took the puck in a step and wound up for a slap shot, drawing the Amherst defense out, only to shoot the puck right back to Koehler in the opposite corner. Koehler's shot beat a sliding Regan putting Lowell up by two at the time. The third period saw some accelerated play from the Minutemen as they went on to outshoot Lowell 13-3. Fillion looked especially strong through several Amherst power=plays as did Lowell's penalty-killing units. The Riverhawks killed off a 5-3 Amherst power-play early in the period with Koehler and Bertram in the box. The two teams traded a few power-plays without scoring but Amherst did pull to within one goal with :51 seconds to play. With Lowell standout Nicholishen in the box for slashing, Amherst had a 6-4 advantage with their goalie on the bench. Amherst defenseman Tom O'Connor took a slap shot through a screen and the puck found the lower left corner right along the ice. Lowell senior Shannon Basaraba cied the victory with an empty net goal off the following face-off at center ice. The draw went toward an Amherst defenseman, but Koehler ended up getting an assist as Basaraba beat the Amherst to the puck and slid it home for his first goal of the season. Scoring Summary First Period Amherst Mackinnon(1) (Norton, Lovell) 0:43 Lowell Koehler(1) (Libett, Basaraba) 2:59 Amherst MacKinnon(2) (Lovell, O'Connor) 8:08 Amherst SHG Lovell(1) (Blanchard) 12:27 Lowell PPG Kidney(1) (Cappelletti, Rooney) 16:49 Second Period Lowell PPG Campbell(1) (Cappelletti, Mulligan) 5:27 Lowell Koehler(2) (Bertram) 10:21 Lowell PPG Koehler(3) (Libett, Nolan) 15:19 Third Period Amherst PPG O'Connor(1) (Lovell, MacKinnon) 19:09 Lowell ENG Basaraba(1) (Koehler) 19:15 Three Stars 1 - Greg Koehler, Lowell 2 - Steve MacKinnon, Amherst 3 - Chris Libett, Lowell HOCKEY-L is for discussion of college ice hockey; send information to [log in to unmask], The College Hockey Information List.