The Daily Collegian

Issue date: 11/6/06 Section: Sports

Media Credit: Karen Winger/Collegian Chris Capraro notched three points in his return to the ice Friday night.

Chris Capraro picked the perfect game to make his season debut for the Massachusetts hockey team.

The Mass Attack got a huge lift from the senior forward, who notched three points in his first game this season. He was held out of the first four games this season due to an undisclosed violation of team rules.

Capraro missed all of the 2004-05 season, but returned last season for his junior year and became one of the Minutemen's best offensive weapons. He scored 19 points during the 2005-06 season on eight goals (seven on the power play) and 11 assists. Already this year, he has two goals and an assist in two games played.

Early in the second period of Friday night's game against Providence, Capraro padded a 1-0 UMass lead with his first goal of the season.

He showed an immense amount of patience, beating Friars goaltender Tyler Sims by skating across the crease from Sims' right to his left, waiting for the goalie to commit.

After getting the feed from Chris Davis, Capraro came in front of the net, and Sims moved up to check the puck and stop any shot. Capraro continued to hold it and carried the puck to Sims' left side, where he sent an easy shot behind the goalie and under the crossbar.

"Not much was really going through my mind," said Capraro after Friday's game. "The defense was in the way and if I made the shot, I figured it would get blocked."

It seemed like an eternity from the time Capraro made an advance at the net to when he finally released the shot. It appeared as he crossed the crease he may have lost control of the puck to a Providence defender, but playing the waiting game with Sims worked out for Capraro, who said that it is actually a habit he's been trying to break.

"I lost the handle for a second but pretty much I knew where it was," Capraro said. "Sometimes I hold onto [the puck] a little too long and it works against me. This time it happened to work for me."

The goal was not Capraro's first point of the season, as the 5-foot-7 left winger assisted on the Minutemen's first goal of the night. He earned the helper in the first period on Cory Quirk's second goal of the season.

In the third, Capraro iced the game for the Mass Attack with his second goal. With under two minutes left and Sims pulled from the net, Quirk intercepted the puck and returned the favor to Capraro, who gladly took the empty-netter, and his third point of the game for a 4-1 UMass lead.

"In practice, we've really been working trying to get pucks in the net and becoming better offensively as a team," Capraro said.

Capraro took junior Zech Klann's spot on the roster, playing on the second line with Quirk and sophomore Chris Davis for most of the game. The move bumped freshman Will Ortiz from the second line to the first.

The moves worked in UMass' favor, as the team grabbed seven goals over the weekend in two games against the Friars.

"We were waiting for [Capraro] for a while," said UMass coach Don Cahoon. "I think we were all anxiously hoping that he would get off to a good start."

Although he hadn't seen action yet this season, Capraro has apparently spent plenty of time in the training room getting ready for his first minutes on the ice.

"He's in the best shape he's been in since he has been here at UMass," Cahoon said. "You reap what you sow, and that's what Chris got out of tonight."

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