HAMDEN \u2014 No. 6 Quinnipiac women\u2019s ice hockey snapped its six game losing-streak to the Colgate Raiders with a dominant 5-1 victory at home Friday evening.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Not often do all three phases of a hockey team manage to work together in perfect tandem, but the performances that come from those rare occurrences are something special.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Tonight\u2019s women\u2019s ice hockey game encapsulated exactly what such a game looks like.\u00a0<\/p>\n
After a difficult 2-1 overtime loss to the Raiders earlier in the season, the Bobcats succeeded in setting a dominant tone early. Before either team could get settled, junior forward Kahlen Lamarche did what she does best.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Put the puck in the back of the net.\u00a0<\/p>\n
On a bouncing puck flipped out of the Bobcats\u2019 defensive end, Lamarche was able to stick-lift Colgate\u2019s senior defenseman Casey Borgiel just long enough to gain control of the puck. Once she was behind Borgiel, Lamarche was in on Davis alone.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI thought we did a really nice job of just getting pucks in behind their defenseman,\u201d Quinnipiac head coach Cass Turner said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The prime chances weren\u2019t exclusive to Lamarche either. Sophomore forward Avery Bairos also had equally strong chances on net, with Davis making up for Colgate\u2019s initial sloppy play in the first half of the initial period.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Even with the Red Deer, Alberta native keeping Quinnipiac\u2019s lead to one, there was only so much the Colgate netminder could do against the number six goal-scoring team in the country. By the end of the contest, that offensive attack was evident on the scoresheet, with the Bobcats outshooting their opponents for the eighth straight game.<\/p>\n
This time, Quinnipiac\u2019s defense would make itself known on the offensive end, with sophomore defenseman Makayla Watson scoring her first of three historic goals on the evening.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re excited she was really in a mindset to fire the puck today, \u201d Turner said. \u201cShe just keeps adding new tools to the toolbox.\u201d<\/p>\n
It wasn\u2019t just the Bobcats\u2019 offense that was shining in the opening period. The Bobcats\u2019 defense played exceptional hockey, keeping the few Colgate chances manageable for sophomore goaltender Felicia Frank.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Sophomore defenseman Ainsley D\u2019Ottavio especially stood out on the defensive end, getting her stick in passing lanes at even strength and on the penalty kill to keep the second period scoreless.\u00a0<\/p>\n
After a Quinnipiac goal was waved off, reviewed to be a good goal and then re-reviewed to be called for goaltender interference, the Colgate side amped up the physicality.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s always a battle with them, and it goes back and forth,\u201d sophomore defenseman Ella Sennick said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The most refreshing part of the defensive performance was its totality. The strong defensive play by the Bobcats\u2019 forwards helped facilitate the defensive scoring that would result in two more goals in the final period.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI trust that someone will cover back, which is why we\u2019re able to take so many risks and why we have so many d goals,\u201d Sennick said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
After another Lamarche goal that put the star forward at 29 goals on the campaign, the Bobcats would get the opportunity to add to their three-goal lead on the man-advantage.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s been a lot of games where they\u2019ve created some really good chances,\u201d Turner said. \u201cIt\u2019s nice when they\u2019re rewarded.\u201d<\/p>\n
And rewarded they were, with Watson putting her second puck of the night past the outstretched pads of Davis. The Brooks, Alberta native would score her first power play goal of the season, and the score would push Quinnipiac\u2019s streak of power play goals to four straight games.\u00a0<\/p>\n
However, even with the four-goal cushion, late-game heroics by Quinnipiac\u2019s netminder would definitively send the Raiders packing. After Colgate took one back from the Bobcat side to cut the lead to three and ruin Frank\u2019s chance at her eighth shutout, the Swedish goaltender would make a beautiful glove save in the closing minutes of the contest, robbing Colgate captain and junior forward Emma Pais.\u00a0<\/p>\n
However, even with the game completely out of the Raiders\u2019 reach, the Bobcats weren\u2019t done yet. For the first time in 15 years, a Quinnipiac women\u2019s ice hockey defenseman scored a hat trick. After two misses from cross ice by Lamarche kept her scoring tally to two, Watson wrote her name in the Quinnipiac record books on her only attempt at the empty net.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cA lot of credit to the coaches for having that confidence in me and wanting me to shoot the puck more,\u201d Watson said. \u201cThe support we have on this team is unreal.\u201d<\/p>\n
The full team win demonstrated what this Bobcat side is capable of when every aspect of the squad is clicking. Offense and defense working together, with goaltending cleaning up whatever few loose ends were left over.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cWe just have to keep it rolling,\u201d Watson said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Quinnipiac will have the chance to prove that this complete performance was not a fluke again tomorrow, taking on No. 12 Cornell University at home in a game with significant conference standing implications. Puck drop in Hamden is set for 3 p.m.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"HAMDEN \u2014 No. 6 Quinnipiac women\u2019s ice hockey snapped its six game losing-streak to the Colgate Raiders with…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":425089,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[377],"tags":[52820,52821,5,52822],"class_list":["post-425088","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-hockey","tag-cass-turner","tag-ella-sennick","tag-hockey","tag-makayla-watson"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/115948758364325908","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/425088","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=425088"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/425088\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/425089"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=425088"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=425088"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=425088"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}