In the aftermath of the Pittsburgh Penguins Stadium Series matchup against the Philadelphia Flyers, the Robert Morris Colonials took to the ice at Heinz Field and downed the Purple Hawks of Niagara 5-1 to claim the 4th seed in the Atlantic Hockey Playoffs.

For a team which has seen most of its scoring come from the front line of Daniel Leavens, Alex Tonge and Brady Ferguson, tonight showed that the Colonials have some firepower in their lower lines as well.

The first two goals of the game were put on the board by Brandon Watt and Rob Mann. With two assists coming from Freshman Jacob Coleman.

The Atlantic Hockey cellar dweller Purple Hawks did their best to limit the Colonial offense through the first half of the period, but Robert Morris was able to show some life which resulted in the two first period goals.

Niagara came out of the game swinging in the second period, killing off a Colonial power play and responding with their first goal of the game by Sam Rennaker to bring the game back to within one.

Robert Morris, who had not been able to get a weekend sweep in over five weeks, was hoping not to let another two points slip through their grasp.

Senior Captain Rob Mann was going to make sure that did not happen. But instead of being the one to score the next RMU goal, he dished the puck to Luke Lynch who struck gold with his ninth goal of the season to bring the Colonials’ lead back up to two.

From there it was all Robert Morris, as the Colonials with Francis Marotte in between the pipes shut out the Purple hawks for the remainder of the game while putting two more up, including Jacob Coleman’s first career score, to bring the final score to 5-1 in favor of the Colonials.

With the regular season completed, Robert Morris finished with a 19-11-4 regular season mark good enough for fourth place in Atlantic Hockey. RMU will get the week off before hosting the Mercyhurst Lakers in a best-of-three series at the 84 Lumber Arena for the right to make it to Rochester for the AHC semifinals.

These two big wins to end the season for the Colonials hope to be momentum builders to propel the Colonials to a NCAA tournament birth.