UMass, Notre Dame play record game

SOUTH BEND, Ind. -- Shane Walsh scored the winning goal in the fifth overtime to lead UMass to a 4-3 victory over Notre Dame in the longest game in NCAA Division I ice hockey history.

The first-round Hockey East tournament matchup lasted 151 minutes, 42 seconds, ending early Saturday morning and surpassing the previous mark of 150:22 in five overtimes, set by Quinnipiac and Union in an Eastern Collegiate Athletic Conference quarterfinal game on March 12, 2010.

"I'm awfully proud and happy for our guys," said UMass coach John Micheletto, whose 12th-seeded Minutemen won their first Hockey East tournament game since 2009.

Notre Dame's Cal Petersen, a Buffalo Sabres prospect, set a Division I record with 87 saves, eclipsing the previous mark of 78, set by RPI's Dick Greenlaw against Boston University in 1965. UMass' Steve Mastalerz finished with 75 saves in the victory.

"You like them to be rewarded," Micheletto said. "They believed and stuck to the game plan."

Walsh's goal came by way of a blocked shot, as Dennis Kravchenko's shot was blocked by Notre Dame defenseman Robbie Russo and found its way to Walsh, who notched his 13th goal of the season.

Russo, who had three assists, said it was a tough way to lose.

"It felt like it was never going to end," Russo said. "It just felt like the puck was never going to go in."

The two teams have no time to rest. The matchup was the first game in a best-of-three opening-round series, and the teams were scheduled to return to the ice at Notre Dame's Compton Family Ice Arena about 18 hours after this game ended.

Fatigue was on the minds of both coaches after the game took nearly six hours to complete.

"That's the way hockey is," Irish coach Jeff Jackson said. "Just like baseball, you play 100 innings if it's a tie game."

The winner of the series advances to a quarterfinal matchup with fourth-ranked UMass-Lowell.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.