LOWELL – The road warriors strike again.

A 5-3 win for the No. 17 UMass hockey team against No. 16 UMass Lowell on Saturday night at Tsongas Center continued the Minutemen’s pattern of picking up important wins away from the Mullins Center this season.

UMass improved to 9-4-3 on the road following Saturday’s victory, plus grabbed five of six points in its weekend series versus the River Hawks, to improve its position in a NCAA tournament picture that is tightening by the day.

With his 167th UMass victory tonight, @CoachCarvelUM has become the all-time winningest coach at UMass 👏#NewMass X #Flagship🚩 pic.twitter.com/orM906XrBh

— UMass Hockey (@UMassHockey) March 2, 2025

“Tough place to play, tough place to win,” Minutemen head coach Greg Carvel —who earned a program record 167th win – said. “Lowell’s a hard team to play against and I give our guys a ton of credit coming here. We don’t usually score a lot of goals in these games against Lowell. Most of them are 2-1, 2-2, like [Thursday] night. For us to find a way to get four [goals] and an empty-netter was a statement for me. I’m very proud of our group. This was a big weekend and to get five of six point against a very good Lowell team is going to go a long way for us.”

The Minutemen’s win solidified their spot below the Pairwise cutline of 13th, while UML’s loss dropped them to 16th.

Sophomores Jack Musa and Aydar Suniev each tallied a goal and assist for UMass (18-12-4), while junior Kenny Connors scored the game-winning goal at 10 minutes, 55 seconds of the third period.

“Honestly, just looking to see what’s open in the moment,” Connors said. “I was just looking to shoot the puck and be confident in my shot.”

Connors took a pass from senior Ryan Lautenbach in the neutral zone and entered the River Hawks’ end with speed, then quickly snapped a shot past UML goalie Beni Halasz’s blocker to put the Minutemen back in front, 4-3.

The River Hawks (15-13-4) had tied the game at 3-3 prior to Connors’ rip with two goals in less than three minutes, making UMass’ third-line center’s strike the most important of the contest.

“I’ve really liked Kenny’s game here the last couple weekends,” Carvel said. “He had the game-winning goal at UConn I think, same thing. He’s playing with a lot of confidence and beginning of the year the shots just weren’t going in and now they’re going in.” 

Junior defenseman Owen Murray secured the ‘W’ for the Minutemen with an empty-net goal that came nearly 200 feet the other end on a clearing attempt at 18:40 of the third period.

Sophomore goalie Michael Hrabal had a huge hand in the win as well, despite crossing Carvel’s Mendoza line of three goals allowed. Hrabal denied a sure-goal late in regulation on a wraparound attempt from the River Hawks that would have evened the score back at 4-4, if it had gone in. UMass’ netminder concluded the game with 30 saves.

“Michael Hrabal to me, I thought was outstanding tonight,” Carvel said. “The goals that they scored were back post, on the defense, not on Mike and he makes that huge wraparound save.

“He’s better in games where he gets action,” Carvel added. “Beginning of the year, we were playing lesser teams and he wasn’t getting any action and we’d come down and he’d have 10 minutes without a shot. Now we’re in the thick of Hockey East, he gets enough shots and I think that’s part of it for him. The more action he gets… because he’s got a competitive spirit and he’s got to be playing in order for that too. I think that’s the difference-maker for him.”

Another similarity in the Minutemen’s recent road success is scoring right away in the first period. Suniev redirected a point shot from freshman Larry Keenan just 1:07 into the game for the sudden 1-0 advantage.

 Just three minutes later on the power play, junior Cole O’Hara one-timed the puck past Halasz at the left faceoff dot, as UMass extended its lead to 2-0 before five minutes had ticked off the clock in the game.

“We’re just more desperate on the road I guess right now,” Musa said. “We got to learn how to do that at home now too.”

The River Hawks had the only goal of the second period courtesy of a Lee Parks deflection at 10:26.

Musa gave the Minutemen a bit of a cushion at 3-1 on an incredible, no-angle goal that picked the top right corner behind Halasz’s head at 4:19 of the third period.

Then UML nabbed a couple quick ones, on markers from Libor Nemec and Owen Cole, knotting it up at 3-3. However, Connor’s ninth of the season nearly two minutes after the River Hawks’ equalizer wound up being the decider in UMass’ eventual 5-3 victory.

“We’ve become consistent, our offense is consistent, our defense and our goaltending is consistent,” Carvel said. “The beginning of the year, we didn’t know what we were going to get from game to game.”

O’Hara’s goal also set a new Minutemen record as the Richmond Hill, Ontario native moved his point streak to 12 consecutive games. O’Hara — now with 47 points — was in some discomfort during the second period after blocking a shot on a UML power play, but after sitting during the tail-end of the second, O’Hara returned to the ice during the third and finished the game.

“You need your best players to be your highest character [players] to be a good team and that’s the situation for us,” Carvel said. “It doesn’t matter how many points anyone has, when it’s time to eat a puck, they eat pucks. It’s great when your older, best players are doing it.”

UMass will close out its regular season with a pair of home games against No. 5 Maine Friday and Saturday at the Mullins Center.