After winning three consecutive ECAC games, the women’s hockey team was unable to create a lead against St. Lawrence on Friday night. The game ended in an overtime tie, 2-2, at Appleton Arena in Canton, N.Y.
Going into the game, the Red was looking forward to taking on the only team to which it lost earlier this season in hopes of earning payback. The first matchup between the Red and the Saints occurred at Lynah Rink on Nov. 14, and the Saints made a three-goal recovery from a 2-0 deficit to defeat the Red.
Both teams were fairly well matched offensively during the first period, with the Red making seven shots on goal to the Saints’ eight. However, it was a power play goal for the Saints 18:04 into the first period, following a holding penalty by freshman Lauriane Rougeau that gave the Saints a temporary lead. This was the third penalty the Red failed to kill this season, and the second in two consecutive weekends.
“The penalty kill was a challenge,” said senior forward Liz Zorn. “We pride ourselves on it so we were obviously disappointed, but we have to take it as it comes. We’ll work on it this week and focus on it during the games against Princeton and Quinnipiac next weekend.”
“We weren’t keeping our forwards high enough,” said sophomore forward Catherine White. “We allowed the Saints to make a lot of middle passes, which is a dangerous thing during the power play.”
The remaining two minutes garnered no points for the Red in the first period, but the Red’s play started to pick up over the course of the last two periods.
The Red got on the board 7:58 into the second period, tying the game 1-1. The goal was made by freshman defender Laura Fortino, assisted by junior forward Hayley Hughes.
Despite the Red’s stronger offensive play the Saints quickly responded within three minutes, regaining the lead, 2-1.
The Red continued to battle hard, but no more goals were scored throughout the rest of that period, or for the majority of the third. The match seemed as though it would end in a St. Lawrence victory as the clock ticked down, but with just over one minute remaining junior forward Karlee Overguard scored for the Red and tied the game, 2-2, assisted by White and senior forward Melanie Jue. This was the second time in three weeks that Overguard saved the Red with a goal late in regulation.
“We got off to a slow start that hurt us,” White said. “Like in a couple of previous games, we were playing catch-up for the first period and playing more of their game rather than establishing our own. We were running around with the puck, but then we came back well. We didn’t give up and played up our strengths, driving to the net and forechecking hard during the second and third periods. We also had better support and puck possession.”
Looking forward, the Red intends to take what it learned from St. Lawrence’s tough competition and implementing better overall game play. The Red needs to learn to not be so flat-footed around stronger players, and continue to perform at full capacity for the entire 60 minutes — they cannot afford to spend the majority of the first period warming up so to speak.
“We’re going to take each game as it comes and put teams away that are below us in the standings,” Zorn said. “We’re fighting for a spot in the playoffs so we have to show these other teams that we’re ready.”
Original Author: Reena Gilani