NEW HAVEN, Conn. — The St. Lawrence men’s hockey team’s early-season unbeaten streak is history.

Yale scored two goals within a span of three minutes in the third period to break open the game and won, 4-2, over St. Lawrence on Saturday night in an ECAC Hockey encounter at Ingalls Rink.

Andrew Miller tallied two goals to spark the Bulldogs (3-2-1, 2-2-0), who rebounded after losing to Clarkson, 1-0, on Friday.

Matt Weninger finished with 28 saves for St. Lawrence (5-2-1, 0-1-1), which suffered its first defeat in six games after engineering a 4-0-1 stretch, including a 3-3 tie at Brown on Friday.

“Every league game is a tough game,” St. Lawrence coach Greg Carvel said. “They’re all close and they’re not easy games.”

The Bulldogs scored the first two goals against the Saints, including Kenny Agostino’s goal at 18:58 of the opening period and Miller’s first goal at 11:28 of the second period.

“I thought we played really well in the first period,” Carvel said. “We were pressuring them and they were having a hard time getting the puck out of our zone. We were playing the way we wanted to play. We hit a crossbar and then they scored a goal on a rebound — and then we just lost control of the game and we lost energy.”

Just 51 seconds later, junior Kyle Essery scored a shorthanded goal to pull St. Lawrence to within 2-1 at 13:19.

“That was a good goal by Kyle and a good effort on our part while shorthanded,” Carvel said. “ ... We found our energy later in the game, but we were unable to sustain what I thought was a really good first period on our part.”

Yale then pulled away with two goals within the first eight minutes of the third.

After Trent Ruffolo scored at 4:34, Miller followed with his second goal, a power-play tally at 7:35.

Sophomore Tommy Thompson followed with a goal at 12:47 to pull the Saints within 4-2.

Goalie Jeff Malcolm stopped 32 of 34 shots for Yale.

St. Lawrence, which entered the weekend among the nation’s leaders in both power play and penalty killing efficiency, went 0-for-7 with the man advantage against the Bulldogs.

“That’s wasn’t very characteristic of us,” Carvel said of his team’s power-play struggles against Yale. “We just have to find a way to get back to the way we were playing. If we can play for 60 minutes like we did before this weekend, then we’ll be successful.

“We definitely kind of got away from the way we were playing before this weekend. This weekend is disappointing, but there’s a long way to go.”

The Saints continue ECAC Hockey play as they will host Princeton on Friday and Quinnipiac on Saturday, with both games starting at 7 p.m.

nNOTES: St. Lawrence has now allowed a power-play goal in each of its past two games after its penalty killing hadn’t allowed a goal in its previous four games entering this weekend. ... Saints senior captain Kyle Flanagan and junior Greg Carey were each held without a point for the first time this season. ... Essery’s goal was the team’s second shorthanded tally of the season. ... St. Lawrence junior defenseman Justin Baker has an assist in each of his past three games.

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