With three huge Cornell sporting events happening on Friday night, men’s hockey proved its capabilities against Princeton, as the game drew a sold out crowd at home in Lynah Rink. No. 5 Cornell destroyed No. 19 Princeton’s winning streak, winning 5-2, in the first of the Red’s three final home games of the fall semester.

From the first faceoff, the Red had a huge offensive outburst. Senior forward Blake Gallagher tallied two goals and an assist, proving why he is the Red’s leading scorer this season. Freshman defenseman Nick D’Agostino, senior forward Joe Scali and junior forward Riley Nash each notched a goal with junior forward Joe Devin tallying three assists for Cornell’s victory.

Just a little over a minute into the game, Joe Devin hit a nice across-the-ice pass to senior captain Colin Greening, in which Greening attempted a shot. Turning this mishit into a goal, Gallagher was there to collect the rebound and tuck it in the net for Cornell’s first goal of the game.

“It’s huge especially against a good team like Princeton you want to get on early. Especially at home, they are trying to take the crowd out of the game … a good way to get the excitement started early,” Gallagher said.

Following the goal, the Tigers (3-4-1, 2-3-1 ECAC Hockey) were quick to retaliate on the attack, but the combination of the Red’s defenders and senior goalie Ben Scrivens was quick to squander any opportunities.

“Gallagher’s goal gave us a little bit of breathing room. Whenever you score in the first two and a half minutes, it always feels nice and then you can settle things down after that and play your game and everything is going to be okay,” said Riley Nash.

Going into the game, the Red knew that its penalty kill unit would have to play sharply because the Tigers have been thriving on converting power plays into goals this season. Yet, Cornell’s penalty kill never provided them a chance in the game.

With 39 seconds remaining in the first period, Joe Devin got the puck off the sideboards to Gallagher, who scored the Red’s second goal of the night.

"I've had good chemistry with Colin [Greening] and Joe [Devin]. You get space playing with two big guys," Gallagher said. "I haven't felt this healthy since freshman year. I'm a lot more confident going into games healthy and not taped together or shot up or whatever the case may be, so that has made a huge difference for me.”

Skating into second period, Cornell notched its third goal of the night, 1:22 into the frame, after Gallagher skated down the right side of the ice before making a clean pass to Nick D’Agostino. D’Agostino took the puck and tucked it into the left side of the net.

From the beginning of the season, head coach Mike Schafer ’86 wanted to create four solid offensive lines, and so far he has done so. Scali, sophomore Sean Collins and freshman John Esposito worked very well together on Friday night and aided in the Red’s fourth goal of the night. Scali worked the puck down the ice, took a shot on goal before picking up the rebound to score.

Going into the third period up, 4-0, the Red knew it just had to maintain its same strategy to finish with the win. After poor timing with the Red’s line change, Princeton scored its first goal of the night before netting its second goal less than five minutes later.

Riley Nash ended the Tigers’ hopes of a comeback with a power-play goal with a little over six minutes remaining in the game. This goal marked Nash’s first goal of the season, an event he has been looking forward to for a while now.

“It felt really good. A lot better than you guys think,” Nash said. “It’s frustrating because in college hockey you play two games a week and when you don’t score, you have the whole week to go on it. It definitely felt good to get it out of the way and continue playing.”

The Red went 1-for-3 on power plays and was able to defend all of its penalty kills. In addition, both goalies tied for 28 saves each, with Cornell narrowly outshooting Princeton, 33-30.

“I thought we played really well tonight. First and third [periods] we were all over them tonight … we generated a lot of chances and didn’t give up much,” Nash said.