The veterans provided the offense and the rookie put up a wall at the other end of the ice as St. Lawrence University's men's hockey team completed a sweep of its ECAC Hockey opening weekend with a 4-0 win at Yale on Saturday night.

The line of seniors Patrick Doherty and Gunnar Hughes and junior Tommy Thompson provided all the offense rookie goaltender Kyle Hayton was to need as they combined for three first period goals as the Saints snapped a 0-5-1 streak against Yale and improve to 6-3-1 overall and 2-0-0 in league play. Yale, which outshot the Saints 32-19, drops to 1-1-2 overall and 0-1-1 in league play. It was the first ECAC season-opening road sweep for the Saints since 2011.

"We came out with good jump and almost scored on our second shift of the game...and then we got the early power play goal," said Saint coach Greg Carvel. "We did a good job with our systems throughout the game and had good energy all night long. We won a lot of the battles, and I don't think the shots were indicative of the way the game went. Kyle made some good saves, but it was more of a team shutout."

Hayton, who has a Saint rookie record three shutouts in his first ten collegiate starts, made 32 saves, but a lot of them came from long range as the Saint defense did a good job of clearing the slot in front of him and knocking rebounds out of harm's way.

Offensively the Saints started quickly, drawing a penalty in the first minute and converting on the power play. The Saints had a scoring chance on the play which drew the penalty, and while a video review confirmed that the puck was stopped by Yale starter Alex Lyon before it crossed the goal line, it didn't take long for the Saints to put one on the board that counted.

Doherty scored his third of the season on a one-timer off a pass by Christian Horn with Brian Ward also assisting 49 seconds into the power play at 1:51 into the game for the early 1-0 lead. It went to 2-0 at 8:56 of the first as Eric Sweetman broke up a Yale rush and sent the puck to Thompson, who in turn relayed it to Hughes just outside the Saint defensive blue line. Hughes rushed up ice and into the Yale zone, beating Lyon on a quick backhander inside the far post for his third of the year.

Thompson made it a 3-0 game with his third of the year at 16:04 as after the Saints worked it down low, a Yale player intercepted a pass, but gave it right back to Thompson, who buried the unassisted goal from in close.,

"We continue to get balanced scoring night to night...any guy, any line and we are finding a lot of confidence," Carvel said. "Four points on the road in this league is something pretty special."

Neither team scored in the second period as the Saints killed off a pair of Yale power plays and Hayton stymied Yale with a dozen saves and it stayed a 3-0 game well into the third period. Junior center Sean McGovern put a cap on a big weekend for the Saints when he scored his third of the weekend, with assists from Justin Bruckel and Chris Martin at 18:30 for the 4-0 final.