Players and coaches from Harvard celebrate with the Whitelaw Cup after defeating Quinnipiac 3-2 in overtime on March 19 at the Olympic Center. (News photo — Parker O’Brien)

LAKE PLACID — Sometimes, things just go your way.

Despite being outshot and at times a bit outplayed, the Harvard Crimson left the Olympic Center in Lake Placid with the ECAC title after defeating the No. 1 Quinnipiac Bobcats 3-2 in overtime on March 19.

The win gave the No.3 Crimson their 11th ECAC title and their third since the tournament returned to Lake Placid in 2014.

“I’m very proud of our guys for sticking with it,” Harvard head coach Ted Donato said. “Battling through some adversity in the game, some guys banged up. But, I’m very proud that we were able to find a way to win.”

While down 2-1 in the third period, the Bobcats poured on shot-after-shot on the Harvard netminder Mitchell Gibson, who seemingly shut down everything, until Quinnipiac finally found a break.

With a little over six minutes left in regulation, the Crimson’s Alex Gaffney was penalized for high-sticking.

Quinnipiac head coach Rand Pecknold decided to pull his goalie for a six-on-four powerplay opportunity.

“I’ve been here 20 years, we do that pretty regularly,” Pecknold said. “We needed to score a goal and I didn’t love our five-on-four that we had. I didn’t think we were confident enough.”

Pecknold’s decision to pull the goalie worked out in his favor when junior defenseman Jayden Lee collected a pass off the faceoff from Wyatt Bongiovanni before burying the game-tying goal over the shoulder of Gibson to force the game into overtime.

“I’ve lined up against Baker plenty of times in my career throughout midget, junior and college so I kind of know his habits,” Bongiovanni said. “I wanted Jayden to be in a particular spot, we had a play set up for us and I was lucky enough to slap it back to Jayden.”

Harvard’s first-year forward Matthew Coronato riffled the puck over the shoulder of the Bobcats’ goaltender Yaniv Perets at 9:18 into overtime. The goal came on assists from Ian Moore and Sean Farrell.

“Ian Moore made a great little draw pass and obviously I tried to get it off my stick as quick as I could. The puck kind of had eyes and found the back of the net,” Coronato said.

Coronato’s goal marked his third of the tournament and his second game-winner of the tournament after lifting his team past Clarkson on March 18.

“It’s an unbelievable feeling. Playing with great players,” Coronato said. “We’ve got a lot of great players. It’s a lot of fun to be with this group. It’s an unbelievable feeling.”

Coronato, who was drafted 13th overall by the Calgary Flames in the 2021 NHL draft, was named the tournament’s most valuable player. Coronato had six points in the two games in Lake Placid.

For Harvard, their only real shot of making it to the NCAA Division I hockey tournament was to win the Whitelaw Cup.

“There was a lot of pressure knowing that if you don’t win, your season is over and nobody wants to be in that position,” Donato said. “That’s something we try and address at the beginning of the season.”

The Crimson jumped out to an early lead when defenseman Ryan Siedem took a slap shot from the point, which hit the Bobcats’ Christophe Fillion before taking a weird bounce in the net.

Siedem’s goal was set up by Marshall Rifai, who made a cross-ice pass to his defensive partner at 1:07 into the opening period.

“Tough one in net. On the first goal, it’s going five feet wide and hits one of my players in the facemask and goes in the net,” Pecknold said. “Just bad luck and that’s the game of hockey. In a 3-2 game, that’s a big one. But it happens.”

A little over three minutes later, Quinnipiac’s TJ Friedmann collected a pass from his teammate Joey Cipollone at center ice before cutting past three Harvard defenders. Skating towards the net, Friedmann shot the puck into the right side corner of the net while falling down to even the game.

In the second period, Harvard was awarded a power-play opportunity after Quinnipiac’s Ethan de Jong received a two-minute penalty for interference.

With the man-advantage, Harvard was able to capitalize with their second goal of the game when Moore one-timed a pass from Coronato to take the lead.

In the third period, the Bobcats put heavy pressure on Harvard’s Gibson, who was a brick wall in net. Gibson shut down 47 shots in the win, while Quinnipiac’s Perets had 14 saves.

When asked about how he felt after recording 47 saves on Saturday, Gibson said he was tired.

“I knew that if I could see it, I was going to stop it,” Gibson said. “I really felt that guys in front of me took care of business keeping most of the stuff to the outside, so I could see some shots from the point. Like coach said, that’s a great team.”

“(Gibson) was outstanding. I think when your goaltender is playing at that level it gives everybody confidence that you can hang in that game,” Donato said. “Mitch really has battled. I think the goaltending position, to me, probably has the toughest positions to take a year off of not seeing shots and not playing back-to-back and not having traffic in front of you.”

Gibson’s play proved to be the difference-maker, earning the Crimson an automatic berth into the NCAA tournament with the win.

Harvard moves to 21-10-3 on the season and will wait to find out who their next opponent is.

“Being against all odds, even in overtime. I think it’s nice sometimes to enjoy the moment, smell the roses if you will,” Donato said. “It’s a really hard accomplishment and I give them a lot of credit and let them just be around each other tonight. Tomorrow, I’ll turn back into coach and get them ready for next weekend.”

“Congrats to Harvard, they battled, they hung in. Mitchell Gibson was crazy good tonight,” Pecknold said. “I thought we played great, I thought we played excellent. We battled.”

Quinnipiac, who holds a record of 31-6-3, will likely receive an at-large bid into the NCAA tournament.

“We obviously wanted to be on the winning side tonight. “But in some cases, we know what it’s like to lose and we don’t want to lose,” Quinnipiac’s captain Bongiovanni said. “We don’t want to feel that way again. It’s harsh now, but we have that experience and we move forward.”