It has been a season of ongoing pain for the University of Vermont men's hockey team ... loss upon loss ... injury upon injury ... frustration upon frustration. But all along the way you had the feeling that some night this team was going to pull it all together and go out and come up with a good win ... and last night in Durham, New Hampshire it finally happened.

The Cats beat UNH last night in Durham 4-3 .... but it wasn't just the fact that they won ... it was the way they did it. Three times UVM fell behind ... three times they came back to tie ... the final time on HT Lenz's goal with just 13 seconds remaining in regulation time. Then in overtime senior Drew MacKenzie buried the game winner ... and for one night at least the frustration went away.

We have been critical of the Catamounts in this space this year ... more than once we have written that it looked like this team had quit for the year. So it is only fair to point out that last night it looked just the opposite. Despite the win, results elsewhere in Hockey East last night officially eliminated Vermont from the playoff race ... but with five more games to play they can still make there presence felt ... and if last night is any indication they may be ready to do exactly that.



The UVM Men's basketball team is back home at the Patrick Gym ... they host Niagara in an ESPN Bracketbuster game this afternoon ... the game will be a one day break in Vermont's drive toward the America East regular season championship ... after this one there will be games at Binghamton and at home against UMBC still to play that will decide the league title ... potential homecourt in the conference championship game and an automatic NIT bid will be at stake.

But today is a day to just go out and play basketball ... no pressure ... no national TV or anything ... despite the event's name ESPN will be nowhere to be seen. The event has lost much of its luster in that regard ... hey, there are so many Bracketbuster games today that if they tried to televise everyone of them they'd use most of the stations on the cable. But who needs them? There will be TV ... right here on NSN Sports.