NORTHFIELD, Vt. - In a battle between nationally-ranked squads, seventh-ranked Norwich scored three goals in the third period to pull away from fourth-ranked Bowdoin in a 5-3 win on Friday evening at Kreitzburg Arena. The Cadets improve to 7-4-1 while the Polar Bears see their four-game win streak snapped as they dip to 7-2-0 overall.

The defending national champs were paced by two goals from Chad Anderson. Timothy McGarry had a goal and an assist for the Polar Bears.

Anderson's first goal of the evening gave the home team a 1-0 lead at the first intermission, but McGarry's equalizer evened things up early in the second stanza. Norwich regained the lead just before the second intermission when Tory Allan scored with just 1:36 remaining in the period.

Norwich pushed the lead to 4-1 when Anderson and Pier-Olivier Cotnoir scored 40 seconds apart midway through the third frame. Bowdoin rebounded 26 seconds later when first-year Harry Matheson scored his sixth goal of the season to trim the lead to 4-2 with 9:59 remaining. Colin Mulvey added an empty-netter for Norwich and Daniel Weiniger tallied a shorthanded goal with 12 seconds left to round out the scoring. 

Richard Nerland made 37 stops and allowed four goals while Parker Carroll made 14 saves for Norwich. The Cadets entered Friday's game averaging nearly six penalties per game but were called for just two compared to seven for Bowdoin. The Polar Bear defense stood tall however, holding Norwich to 0-7 on the power play.