Penn State ice hockey head coach Joe Battista may have summed up his team's Wednesday night contest against No. 11 Towson best.

"If I didn't see it with my own eyes, I wouldn't have believed it," he said.

Battista is referring to the fact that his Icers scored a short-handed goal, netted two power play goals and outshot the Tigers 55-20.

Clearly an Icers victory, right?

Nope.

The two teams skated to a 5-5 tie.

Towson jumped out to a quick 2-0 lead when forwards Earl Ambler and Mike Rivells netted goals on the Tigers first two shots of the game.

But the Icers responded to cut the lead to one when forward Bill Downey lit the lamp with just over three minutes left in the first period.

The momentum quickly went back to Towson early in the second period when Ambler took advantage of an Icer penalty to make it 3-1.

The Icers could have fallen behind even further after giving up another penalty midway through the period. But forward Kyle Jordan scored a shorthanded goal to trim the lead back to one.

The Icers' special teams units capitalized again late in the period when Greg Held put home a power play goal.

Downey added his second goal of the game during another power play situation with just under two minutes left in the period to give the Icers their first lead of the game at 4-3. The pesky Tigers tied it up again just 31 seconds before the intermission on forward Chris Macchione's goal.

Twenty-nine seconds into the third period the Tigers took the lead again when defenseman James Lenz beat Icer goalie Scott Graham.

The Icers charged back to knot the score once more when defenseman Brandon Cook scored with 13 minutes left in the game.

The Icers failed to take advantage of several good opportunities down the stretch and a penalty in overtime essentially ended any hopes of pulling off a victory. Instead the Icers had to settle for their second tie of the season.

Battista said his team's somewhat sloppy and inconsistent play was due to fatigue.

"That's our fourth game in eight days and I think it showed," he said. "We just didn't have the jump in our legs."

The Icers spent most of last week north of the border. Battista's club won the Two Nations Cup Tournament in Toronto and lost to York University, a perennial Canadian power last week.

Another factor that deprived the Icers (13-3-2, 11-2-2 ACHA) of a victory last night was the stellar play of Towson (11-4-1) goalie Jason Pilon, who made 50 saves. Pilon didn't play in the first matchup of the two teams, a 5-1 Icer triumph.

"He played excellent," Cook said. "I have a lot of respect for him. He was a very quick goalie and he definitely has a lot of skill."

Although the tie was a humbling experience for his squad, Battista said his players must get over it quickly because West Virginia is coming to town this weekend for a pair of games.

"We don't have much time to wallow and pity ourselves over this one," he said.