Ten different Foresters registered a point but the team dropped a 6-4 decision to visiting Marian University in Saturday night's regular season finale.
The Lake Forest seniors were honored before their final career home game and one of them, forward Zach Leonard, scored just 57 seconds into the contest. The unassisted goal was his third tally of the season.
The Forester lead was short-lived, however, as the Sabres pulled even just 82 seconds later and took the lead at the 8:19 mark.
The visitors added to their advantage at the 6:33 mark of the second period and converted a power play opportunity to make the score 4-1 at 9:06.
Lake Forest Head Coach Sean O'Malley used his timeout at that point and the Foresters responded with three goals in the next eight minutes. Freshman forward Jared Gerger started the comeback at 10:21 with his eighth of the year. Assists were credited to freshman forward Noah Furman and defenseman Matteas Derraugh. Will Lebel pulled the home team to within a goal at the 15:24 mark and fellow senior forward Josh Giacomin tied the score a minute later. Freshman defenseman Hardy Wagner and senior forward Kyle Cote set up Lebel's sixth of the season while Giacomin's 11th was assisted by senior forward Cullen Kane and junior defenseman Erik Nilsson.
The game's second intermission began three minutes and 10 seconds early due to a small damaged section of the ice. When the teams returned from the locker room, they remained tied at four for the rest of the period and then switched directions for the last 20 minutes.
Marian netted what proved to be the game-winner at the 5:43 mark and added an insurance goal with 2:03 remaining. The Foresters pulled their goalie with more than a minute-and-a-half remaining but were unable to close the gap.
In addition to Senior Day, it was also the Foresters' Alumni Day and the Peter Taylor Award was presented to Giacomin, the team leader in goals and assists, at the end of the opening period.
Lake Forest finished the regular season with an overall record of 7-16-2 while Marian improved to 10-12-3. Both teams are now 5-9-2 in Northern Collegiate Hockey Association play.
The Foresters will travel to league champion Adrian College, the top-ranked team in the nation, for an NCHA Harris Cup quarterfinal series next weekend.
