O'FALLON, Ill. - McKendree University D2 men's hockey closed out the 2021 portion of its schedule with back-to-back wins over Saint Louis at McKendree Metro Rec Plex on Friday and Saturday. The Bearcats held off late pushes by Saint Louis and took the lead in the latter moments of the third period to win. 

Game 1, Friday, December 10:
McKendree struck first under five minutes into the relocated Friday contest with the Billikens, with senior forward Cayden Brilley scoring first off an assist from Ryan Radke and Joey Bernardini.  

SLU responded with three goals in the rest of the first period, taking a 3-1 lead over the Bearcats at the first intermission. McKendree then went on to score three times in the second period, taking a 403 lead over the Billikens off goals from forward Garrett Poole and a pair of scores via forward Daniel Nomerstad. 

Entering the third period, McKendree held the one-goal advantage over the Billikens and held off an aggressive visitor attack until the 18:41 mark when SLU fired a goal, which knotted the match up at four scores a piece. 

The Bearcats and Billikens fought for possession of the puck over the final moments but McKendree found an opening, leading to a breakaway for graduate forward Nick Nelson. The forward Nelson fired a score with just 0.3 seconds remaining on the clock. 

The Bearcats took the first contest of the weekend on a count of 5-4. 

Game 2, Saturday, December 11:
The second matchup of McKendree and Saint Louis looked to be in the hands of the Bearcats early on with the hosts holding a 3-0 lead at the end of the first period. McKendree gained the lead with two scores from graduate forward Derek Northrop (7:10, 15:35) and another from Brilley (9:49).

SLU tied the game up at three goals each with three scores in the first 13 minutes of teh second period whole the Bearcats forward Nelson fired the Bearcats' fourth score fo the game at the 16:03 mark. SLU then evened the game at 17th minute. The 4-4 tie carried into the third and final period. 

McKendree struck with the first goal of the third period behind Nelson's second goal of the day, putting his team up 5-4. The Billikens then struck with goals in the 6th, 9th, and 10th minutes to go up 7-5 over the hosting-Bearcats with just 10 minutes left in the game. At the 10:36 mark of the third, McKendree found life in a goal from graduate forward Christian Blandina. Just eight seconds after the sixth goal from McKendree, graduate defender Dmytro Golovko tied the game between the Bearcats and Billikens up at 7 goals each. 

With a battle for the puck over the last nine minutes, McKendree found themselves in position for a coordinated attack and put in the game-winning goal in the 17th minute of action. Blandina and Nomerstad found the forward Nick Nelson during a forward moving attack, with Nelson receiving a pass just in fron of the opoosition's net, puttting in through for the hat-trick and winning goal. 

The goal by Nelson marked back-to-back game-winners for the forward.

McKendree took the second outing of the weekend by one goal, 8-7, to go 2-0 to cap off the 2021 fall/winter schedule. 

UP NEXT:
McKendree D2 men's hockey will return to the ice with a matchup against SIU Edwardsville at the McKendree Metro Rec Plex on January 21.