PRINCETON, N.J. — Freshman forward Sullivan Mack and junior defenseman Sebastian Dirven each scored their first goals of the season in front of freshman goaltender Ian Shane's second straight shutout, and the Cornell men's hockey team clinched a first-round bye through the ECAC Hockey Championship playoffs with a 4-0 victory over Princeton on Saturday night at Hobey Baker Rink.
 
Delivering a quintessential road effort for a second straight night, Cornell (17-8-4, 12-6-4) surrendered minimal quality scoring chances to facilitate Shane's evening. He finished the game with 21 saves, a scant half of his tally from 43 stops to stump league-leading Quinnipiac on Friday. It marks the first time this season the Big Red has recorded shutouts in consecutive games.
 
The victory assures Cornell (17-8-4, 12-6-4 ECAC Hockey) a fourth-place finish in the league, which comes with a week off before the right to host a best-of-three quarterfinal series March 11-13 at Lynah Rink in Ithaca against the highest remaining seed to survive four first-round series.
 
With that proverbial carrot dangling within reach, the Big Red pounced early against a Princeton (8-18-2, 7-13-1) squad that touched off a midseason Cornell slump with a 5-4 victory at Lynah Rink on Jan. 21. Mack got the Big Red on the board just 46 seconds into the game this go-around, snapping a shot from the slot past Jeremie Forget's blocker off a feed from junior Matt Stienburg. Junior defenseman Sam Malinski started the play by holding his ground inside the blue line to cut down an attempted breakout pass up the wall.
 
Cornell ran with the momentum of the early lead and kept the pressure on throughout the remainder of the first period, forcing 16 saves out of Forget while keeping Shane's involvement relatively minimal on the other end. The freshman goaltender was needed even less in the second period, making saves on the only four shots he saw.
 
Dirven doubled the Cornell lead with his second collegiate goal at the 15:52 of the second period. The familiar web of Cornell's overlapping arcs along the periphery in the offensive zone led senior forward Kyle Betts to feed Dirven heading into the left circle. With his defender needing an extra second to close down the space on him, Dirven fired a shot from near the dot that beat Forget to the far side and pinged into the net off the post.
 
While the breathing room was surely appreciated, it turned out not to be needed. Instead, Cornell added on with a third goal from senior forward Liam Motley. After a pass from a Princeton defenseman in the neutral zone clattered into the skates of a teammate, Motley swooped in to gain possession and worked his way across the ice and into the offensive zone. By the time he entered the right circle, he picked a spot to the far side and muscled a shot in off Forget's blocker for his second goal of the year.
 
Sophomore forward Kyle Penney then closed then scoring with an empty-net goal.