Hanover, NH -- A four-goal second period outburst by the Western Michigan Broncos put the Dartmouth Big Green down and out in game one of a two-game set Friday evening at Thompson Arena.

The Broncos scored four times in the second period, twice on the power play and once shorthanded, to open a 1-1 tie into a 7-3 victory.

"They made the best of their opportunities, no question about it," said Big Green head man Bob Gaudet. "They found a way, they caught us on our heels and I wasn't pleased with our second period. When we don't play as well as we can, we're susceptible against a good hockey team like theirs. We gave up a lot of pucks inside our blue line in that second period that weren't forced turnovers, and they made the best of their chances."

The Big Green got on the board first when Bronco goaltender Jeff Reynaert swung the Big Green dump-in towards the near-corner boards. The puck ricocheted out to Gary Hunter, who immediately fired. His shot was tipped by Frank Nardella past Reynaert, who had leaned the other way.

The Broncos answered nine minutes later. Daryl Andrews' shot from the blue line was tipped wide of Eric Almon by Brett Mills and Corey Waring was there to pounce on the loose puck and put it into the net.

In the second period it took only eight seconds of Western's second power play for the Broncos to take the lead. A David Cousineau point wrist shot was deflected by Steve Rymsha straight over the shoulder of Almon.

Brent Rumble made it 3-1 1:06 later. Rumble intercepted a clearing pass right on the blue line coming off the bench. He cut down the left wing and put a backhander up high over Almon.

The Big Green had a chance to get back into the game with two consecutive power plays. The Broncos killed the first one and on the second one, Ryan Burkart lost the puck at the blue line, enabling Corey Waring to take the puck and break in on Almon. Waring went with a snapshot to Almon's stick side and made it 4-1.

After the rest of the Big Green power play was killed off, the Broncos received one of their own, on which Cousineau's point shot was picked up off the rebound by Anthony Battaglia and put over Almon for the 5-1 lead. That chased Almon from the goal and put in Nick Boucher for the Big Green.

"We decided to get the puck to the net," said Bronco head coach Jim Culhane. "There's not really a turning point to the game at all. They were able to come out and score first and we were fortunate to come back and tie it at the end of one. That second goal was a momentum goal, and then we got another one to get the momentum swinging.

"That's what we were looking for was to jump on the puck and win those one-on-one battles. It was to get that puck to the net. It doesn't have to be a pretty goal, and on a couple of them we were lucky and they went in."

At the start of the third period, as the Big Green finished killing off a fourth Western power play, Michael Byrne received a home-run pass and broke in alone on Reynaert. Reynaert made the quick glove save, but Byrne got the puck back and placed a pass on Dan Casella's waiting stick in the slot. Casella one-timed it past Reynaert to pull the Big Green within three goals.

But the Broncos answered three and a half minutes later. Jeff Lukasak head-manned the rush up ice and dropped on for Caley Jones. Jones' quick pass to Jason Redenius was put high into the net to make the Bronco lead four once again.

The lead went to five for the first time on the evening on the third Bronco power play goal. Cousineau's shot just floated past Boucher.

A Big Green power-play goal by Peter Mahler made it 7-3 with less than a minute to go, but it was not enough.

"I'd like to see us make better decisions at our end of the ice and that's where they jumped on us with our errors," said Gaudet. "These are situations that are common in the game and we have to do a better job of getting the puck out of our own end."

Western (6-5-2) and Dartmouth (1-3-2) will face off once again on Saturday evening.

"I didn't want to lose tonight, but tomorrow night we have to go out there and get better," said Gaudet.