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For the second weekend in a row, the University of Maine women’s hockey team learned that anything that can go wrong, will go wrong.
After coming back twice to tie the game, a late third-period goal and a penalty-filled final minute stopped the Black Bears’ quest for their first conference win. On Saturday, the Black Bears fell 3-2 at Alfond Arena. UMaine proceeded to be swept Sunday falling 4-2 to the Friars.
“When you have the possibility to be on the power play and you take dumb penalties in the last minute, you shoot yourself in the foot,” said UMaine head coach Guy Perron. “From an overall standpoint we had our chances, but we had people who did not show up to play and we can’t play with only two defenseman.”
After the Friars notched the eventual game-winning goal with less than four minutes left in the game, UMaine applied more pressure hoping to create a late second rally. However, things started to go down hill for the Black Bears when Cheryl White and the Friars’ Kristin Gigliottie were called for matching minors forcing a 4-on-4 situation. Seconds after the penalty, UMaine goalie Rachel Gettings was pulled for a 5-on-4 advantage.
The advantage however, quickly disappeared. With a little more than 40 seconds left, forward Sonia Corriveau was disqualified from the game after receiving a five-minute major for hitting a Providence player with the end her stick. With the net still unprotected, PC’s Hilary Greaves was dragged down by Kelly Law. Law was then given a penalty for interference, which forced Gettings back into the net.
“Its just a matter of us keeping our heads straight and not taking stupid penalties and we lost our focus in the last two minutes of the game,” said senior forward Tristan Desmet. “We’re a better team 5-on-5 against them but, it’s those penalties that kill us and we got to stop taking those penalties and start winning games.”
Before things went awry for the Black Bears, they were able to tie the game at 2-2 early in the third period. On the tally, Desmet blazed past the Friar defense en route to a breakaway goal. Desmet’s goal was the third power play goal scored by UMaine in the last two games.
Besides cutting the Friar lead, the goal also sparked a Black Bear offense attack that had only mustered 11 shots through the first two periods. Halfway through the final period the Black Bears missed two near goals. The first coming when Brigitte LaFlamme won a face-off in the Friar zone to Corriveau, who sent a shot just wide of the net. Minutes later, UMaine’s best chance to take the lead came when White took a shot outside the face-off circle that went past Friar netminder Amy Thomas and hit the post.
The Black Bears first tally of the game saw Desmet skate her way through the Friar defense, only to have her shot turned away by Thomas. White proceeded to hammer the puck home deadlocking the game at 1-1.
“I just knew Tristan was going to shoot it and I had to get to the net just in case there was a rebound,” said White, who has scored three goals this season. “There are going to be times where we are going to be down, but we have to keeping going hard and just keep staying positive.”
In a sign of things to come, UMaine surrendered a goal with less than a minute left in the period. With Providence deep within UMaine territory, a turnover caused Graves to set up Cherie Hendrickson, who beat Gettings for the 2-1 lead.
The lone bright spot for UMaine on Saturday was the fact that they stopped Providence’s first line from registering a point. The Friars’ Karen Thatcher and Rush Zimmerman entered the game as the conference’s leading scoring duo.
“We knew their number one line was good and we focused on trying to break their line down as well as the other lines,” said Gettings, who stopped 18 shots. “The whole team played well overall but we just could not get the tying goal in the end.”
On Sunday, the Lady Black Bears came into the game looking for their first win in Hockey East Conference play.
At 3:45 in the first period of play, Tristan Desmet scored on goalie Amy Thomas, after Thomas stopped a shot by Laura Maddin. The rebound was left behind by Thomas and Desmet pushed it in for her fifth goal of the season. Maddin picked up her first assist of the year on the play. Still early on in the first period, UMaine defenseman Kelly Law was called for holding which led to a power play goal by Friars forward Hilary Greaves. Greaves received a centering pass from defenseman Kristin Gigliotti. Later on Friars forward Rush Zimmerman was put in the penalty box for holding, which led to a shorthanded breakaway goal by forward Kelli Doolin. It was the third shorthanded goal UMaine has allowed this season.
With just 1:48 seconds gone in the second period Zimmerman scored another breakaway goal on Gettings. Only twelve minuets later, at 13:34 in the second, Andrea Steranko pushed a bouncing puck from Law past Thomas to pull the Black Bears to within one goal.
For Steranko it was her second goal of the year and the first assist of the season for Law. UMaine forward, Amy Quirion, who was filling in for the suspended, Sonia Corriveau, nearly scored the game tying goal with five minutes remaining in the second, when the goal was overturned. The refrees claimed that the puck hit the post and never crossed the goal line. With the goal called back the wind had officially been knocked out of the Black Bears’ sails.
The Friars closed out the Black Bears early in the third period when freshman Jenna Keilch blocked a pass by Law and took it down the ice for the third breakaway goal of the game.
Thomas stopped 26 of Maine’s 28 shots on goal to increase her record and the Friar’s to 6-2-3 and 2-0-0 in Hockey East. The three stars of the game were all Providence players, Zimmerman Doolin and Keilch all took home the honors.
With the lost the Black Bears fall to 3-4-2, and 0-3-1 in Hockey East Play. UMaine will look to avenge their 4-2 loss next week when they travel to Colgate.
