Courtesy Salem State Sports Information

Salem, MA—Salem State defeated the Rams of Framingham State 8-2 in a Massachusetts State Collegiate Athletic Conference matchup on Saturday afternoon at Rockett Arena. The victory was a milestone for Vikings head coach Bill O'Neill who recorded his 500th career victory.

O'Neill is now the fifth active coach, and just the seventh all-time in NCAA Division III history to reach the 500 win plateau. O'Neill, who is in his thirty-first season as head coach of the Vikings, has compiled an overall record of 500-310-54. During his career he has led Salem State to a pair of NCAA Final Four appearances, six NCAA tournament bids, three ECAC East playoff titles and 20 Massachusetts State Collegiate Athletic Conference championships.

The win improves Salem State to 13-8-3 overall, and 10-4-3 in the MASCAC while Framingham State slides to 5-14-4, and 3-11-3 in conference.

The Vikings opened up a two-goal lead early in the first period as Chris Costigan (Salem, NH) connected on a pass fromDerek Crocker (Wakefield, MA) andCameron Banwell (Toronto, Ontario} just 4:34 into the game.  Minutes later the VikingsIan Flanagan (New Hampton, NH) netted another score with an assist fromGiancarlo Capodanno (Mountainside, NJ).  The Rams countered with a power-play goal from Daniel Miressi (Monroe, CT) with eight minutes remaining.  However, in the final fifteen seconds of the first period, Nick Lampson (Groton, MA), scored a short-handed goal after a steal by Banwell to make the score 3-1; giving Salem State a huge boost heading into intermission.

Framingham State had several scoring opportunities in the second period including a break- away opportunity, but Salem State goaltenderRyan Sutliffe (Grand Forks, ND) stood his ground.  The Vikings then pulled away on back-to-back goals bySutton Wilson (Kalamazoo, MI) and Eric DeFelice (Chalfront, PA) to boost the lead to 5-1.  Wilson's goal was unassisted while Lampson was credited with the assist on DeFelice's goal.  Miressi scored his second goal of the game with under two minutes remaining to cut the deficit to 5-2 going into the 3rd.  Tom Manning (Rockland, MA) earned the marker for Framingham State.

The Vikings broke open the game in the third, scoring three times to seal the milestone victory for O'Neill. Costigan scored his second goal on the power-play with assists by Lampson and Crocker in the sixth minute, and  seconds later Salem State scored again to make it 7-2 on a Nick Del Rosso (San Mateo) goal.Ian Flanagan (New Hampton, NH) added another power-play goal to close the scoring and make the final 8-2.

Sutliffe recorded 25 saves in the victory and was relieved by Ed Fritz (Seal Beach, CA) who finished the game without facing a shot. Framingham State's Nick Cafrelli (San Jose, CA) stopped 37 shots while his back-up Herbert Kyles (Overland Park, KS) was credited with five saves in just over five minutes of action.

Salem State, which currently owns the second seed for the upcoming MASCAC Tournament will host its final regular season game against Worcester State University on Tuesday at 7:00 PM.  The Rams play again on Tuesday at 7:30 PM at UMass-Dartmouth.