ITHACA, N.Y. – Rebecca Johnston was named ECAC Hockey's Player of the Year, and junior Lauriane Rougeau was named the league's Best Defensive Defensemen, highlighting an excellent night for the Big Red at the ECAC Hockey year-end awards banquet in the Statler Hotel on Thursday night.

Other winners for the Big Red included senior forward Chelsea Karpenko, who was named the league's Best Defensive Forward along with Reagan Fischer of Dartmouth. Jillian Saulnier earned Rookie of the Year honors two weeks after being named Rookie of the Year in the Ivy League.

Johnston, who won the conference's Rookie of the Year award in 2008, completed her college career by earning her first Player of the Year Award. She leads Cornell and the conference with 51 points before this weekend's conference tournament semifinals and final. Also named the Ivy League Player of the Year this season, she has also earned nomination for the Patty Kazmaier Award for the second consecutive season.

Rougeau is also a nominee for the Patty Kazmaier Award, and her performance this season shows why. Her plus/minus rating of +43 is best in the league and nine points higher than anyone not on the Big Red's roster. She generally stays on the blue line, but she has come through with three power play goes on the year, five goals total and 20 assists.  She has been named a Second-Team All-American and a Patty Kazmaier Award nominee each of the last two years.

Karpenko's award is her first individual year-end honor in her four-year career. She was named to ECAC Hockey's second team after last year and the Ivy League's first team after last season, and this year her performance as a defensive forward put her over the top. She is tied for 16th in the league with 32 points on 17 goals and 15 assists, and most recently she had a five-point weekend against Brown in the ECAC Hockey Tournament Quarterfinals.

Saulnier's career has started incredibly well, and she has played on the Big Red's top line most of the season with Johnston and sophomore forward Brianne Jenner. Adding the league's Rookie of the Year trophy to her mantle made sense after a freshman campaign that saw her rack up 21 goals and 23 assists. Her 44 points puts her fourth in ECAC Hockey behind Johnston, Jenner and Harvard's Jillian Dempsey.

Four members of the Big Red roster made the league's first team, including Johnston, Rougeau, Jenner and junior defenseman Laura Fortino. Saulnier made the All-League Second Team and the All-Rookie Team.

Cornell will have an opportunity to showcase its dominance over the conference in the tournament semifinal on Friday. The top-seeded Big Red will be looking for its third consecutive tournament championship with a 3:30 p.m. contest against sixth-seeded Quinnipiac.