BRUNSWICK

Bowdoin College senior men’s hockey player John McGinnis has put together the kind of start athletes dream about.

In the opening weekend of the New England Small College Athletic Conference season against Middlebury and Williams Nov. 15-16, McGinnis picked up three goals and three assists as the Polar Bears started the campaign with a win (6-0 over Middlebury) and a tie (3-3 against Williams).

McGinnis’ hot start continued on Friday in the traditional home-and-home series with rival Colby, with Bowdoin coming away with a 5-3 victory at Sidney J. Watson Arena behind two goals and an assist from the sniper. Bowdoin also won on Saturday at Waterville, taking a 6-3 decision.

Through four games, McGinnis has 11 points (five goals, six assists) to lead the Polar Bears.

“It is wonderful and a little concerning, knowing that we need to get other people going, but (McGinnis) and Connor (Quinn) have been playing great and showing great leadership,” said Bowdoin coach Terry Meagher. “I thought Colby played great. They controlled the neutral zone, and it took us some time to play through that.”

“It has been a good start, and coming into my senior year I knew that I had to produce and lead,” said McGinnis. “This is always the biggest game, with the most fans, and at the get-go our emotions got to us and we fell behind right away (2-0).

Colby had the jump early, getting a goal each from Colin Reilly and Nate Morgan in the opening 8:36 of the first period for the two-goal lead.

But, Bowdoin began to take over in the second half of the opening frame. Freshman goaltender Emerson Verrier made two saves to keep Bowdoin off the board, but was able to do little when Danny Palumbo set up freshman Daniel McMullen at 13:53 of the first to cut the lead in half. Kendall Culbertson picked up the second assist on McMullen’s first Polar Bear goal.

“Going into the second with a two- goal deficit would have been rough, so getting that goal late in the first, down only one, we knew there was a lot of game left and we kept going,” said McGinnis. “This is the hardest game, and they got a couple lucky bounces early. We had to shake it off, knowing that we are the better team. We took it over in the end.”

McGinnis takes over

Still trailing by a goal midway through the second period, McGinnis stepped on the gas and took the game over.

With 9:56 left, the senior gathered a pass from McMullen and calmly slipped a shot between Verrier’s pads to tie the game. Quinn also picked up an assist.

McGinnis did it on his own to put the Polar Bears ahead for the first time. Coming off the bench, he stole a Colby clear just inside the blue line and launched a slapshot inside the right post with 3: 19 remaining in the middle frame.

Colby tied the game on a Mike Rudolf even-strength goal 2:46 into the final period, but Bowdoin refused to be denied, with McGinnis setting up first-year Matt Lison for the go-ahead goal on the power play at 4:30. Less than seven minutes later, Lison set up the Bowdoin power play, passing to Quinn to make for a 5- 3 contest. The Polar Bears finished 2- for- 4 with the man advantage.

“We haven’t had a lot of penalties, and you can work on it all that you want in practice, but those power plays were huge,” said Meagher.

After allowing two goals on the first four shots he faced, Bowdoin goaltender Max Fenkell settled in, finishing with 24 saves.

“ Max made some key saves,” said Meagher of Fenkell.

McGinnis was awarded the Pete Schuh Memorial Award as the game’s MVP.

“ My parents flew up from Florida for the game, so that was cool,” said McGinnis. “ This is only the second time we have won at home in my four years, with the award normally going to the winning team. Today, it was us.”

Verrier turned aside 22 shots in the loss.

Saturday at Waterville

Quinn netted a hat trick to lead the Polar Bears to their second win in as many days over Colby, 6-3, on Saturday evening at Alfond Arena.

The Polar Bears remained unbeaten and improved to 3-0-1 this season. Bowdoin has dominated the long-time series of late, winning 11 of the last 13 meetings, including five straight at Alfond.

The Mules are at 0-3-1.

With two assists on the evening, McGinnis surpassed the 100-point mark for his career. He is the 36th Polar Bear in school history to reach the milestone.

As they did on Friday evening, the Mules jumped ahead 2-1, getting another early goal — this time from EJ Rauseo just 1:17 into the contest. Bowdoin evened it on Brendan Conroy’s first career goal at 7: 47 before Mario Benicky’s power play marker put Colby back on top at 12:51.

Bowdoin got a key goal from Quinn just 52 seconds before the end of the period to deadlock the contest heading into the first intermission.

The Polar Bears completely dominated the action from there, starting with two goals in the second period. Bowdoin took the lead for good on Culbertson’s first goal the season, and added a power-play goal from Lison to make it 4-2 after two frames.

The onslaught continued in the third, as Quinn posted a short-handed goal, stealing the puck at the blue line and beating two Colby defenders before sliding the puck past Verrier to make it 5-2.

Quinn put home a powerplay goal at 10:14 to complete the hat trick and make it 6-2.

Cam MacDonald scored a late goal for Colby to round out the scoring.

Peter Cronin earned his first collegiate win in net for Bowdoin by stopping 39 shots.

The Polar Bears will return to action on Tuesday evening when they play at the University of New England at 7 p.m.