SARATOGA SPRINGS, NY (November 30, 2025) – In an exciting championship game, the Tufts University hockey team won the Skidmore Thanksgiving Invitational in a shootout against the host team on Sunday evening.
The game was tied 3-3 at the end of regulation. The Jumbos then withstood a Skidmore power play in the overtime period when neither team scored and the game went to a shootout.
Cole Dubicki scored on Tufts' second shot to even the round at 1-1. Jumbo senior goalie
Gus Bylin saved the next Skidmore attempt before Tufts'
Ethan Ullrick scored to put the Jumbos up 2-1. Skidmore's Theo Angelopoulos then tried to surprise Bylin with a quick shot from the right circle, but Bylin made the stop to win it for Tufts.
The Jumbos had trailed 2-0 at the halfway point of the game before battling back and taking a 3-2 lead early in the third period. However, the Thoroughbreds evened the score at 3-3 with 10 minutes to play in regulation and the game would go to OT and the shootout round.
Skidmore got out to its 2-0 lead when Bryan Tang and Cooper Rice both scored goals off rebounds in the first period. The Thoroughbreds outshot Tufts 13-6 in the opening frame.
Tufts regrouped and scored the only goal of the second period to pull within 2-1.
Philippe Lamarre started the play at his own blue line, getting the puck up to
Brendan Fennell. He moved it to
Max Resnick, who saw defenseman
Zach Rizzo open in the right circle. Rizzo passed to Fennell who had moved in on the right post and he chipped a shot in at 11:28 of the middle stanza.
The Jumbos evened the score with the first of two power-play goals to start the third period. Resnick won the opening faceoff back to
Drew Pitts, who sent it up to Fennell along the right boards at the blue line. He fed Resnick entering the zone and from the outside edge of the right circle he fired a pass to
Trace Norwell high in the slot for a game-tying goal just 14 seconds into the period.
Eli Pilosof put Tufts ahead when he carried the puck from his own end into the Skidmore zone before dumping it in. The Thoroughbred goalie tried to make a pass from behind the net, but it hit Pilosof and left him an empty net to score into for a 3-2 Jumbo lead 6:39 into the third period.
Skidmore would tie the game just three minutes later. A Brandon Spaulding shot hit the post, then Christian Day got the puck along the right boards. He passed to Ashton Breyer who was coming down from the left point, and his shot hit the post again. The puck came right back out to him though, and he scored at 9:54 for a 3-3 score.
Bylin made three saves in the overtime period, including one during an early Skidmore power play. Lamarre blocked a shot during Skidmore's extra-man opportunity.
Winning the tournament championship in the shootout, Tufts (4-2-1) has now won regular-season tournament titles in each of the last three years. They won the North Country Tournament at SUNY Canton last year, and the Boston Landing Tournament at Warrior Ice Arena in 2023-24.
Skidmore (3-3-2) outshot Tufts 36-34, with Bylin making 33 saves in 65 minutes and Thoroughbred Tommy Aitken stopping 31 shots. The Jumbos scored twice on the power play – in three attempts – for the first time this year. Skidmore was 0 for 3 with an extra man. Fennell finished with a goal and an assist for Tufts, while Bryce Terry assisted two goals for Skidmore.
Ullrick was named the Tournament MVP, while Bylin and Norwell made the All-Tournament team. Tang and Dylan Shane were All-Tournament selections for Skidmore.
Tufts returns home and to NESCAC action next weekend against Colby College on Friday and Bowdoin College on Saturday at Valley Forum in Malden.
--JUMBOS--
