Box Score

ITHACA, N.Y. -- Cornell scored a pair of first period goals and held on for a 2-1 victory over Colgate in an ECAC Hockey women's quarterfinal contest on Friday afternoon at Lynah Rink. Laura Fortino and Kendice Ogilvie scored goals for the Big Red, which won a post-season game for the first time in program history.

Amanda Mazzotta stopped 25 shots for the Big Red, which improved to 16-8-6 on the year with the victory. Colgate got its lone goal from Evan Minnick early in the third period, but could not get the tying goal. Lisa Plenderleith stopped 23 shots in taking the loss for the Raiders (12-19-4).

Cornell took the early lead on an impressive individual effort by Fortino, who took on all five Colgate defenders, fell to her knees in between the faceoff circles and still ripped a shot over the shoulder of Plenderleith midway through the first period for the 1-0 Cornell lead. Five minutes later, Jess Martino knocked a puck loose in the Colgate end, with it squirting to the stick of Ogilvie. The sophomore then fired off a shot that beat Plenderleith for what would turn out to be the game-winning goal.

A scoreless second period followed, a period that saw the Big Red kill off nearly six full minutes of penalties, with the first two overlapping by 11 seconds and the second and third separated by just two seconds. Colgate turned up the pressure in the third period, and finally got on the board on the power play. With 4:26 gone in the third period, Colgate's Jacquie Colborne fired a shot from the point that got through traffic in front of Mazzotta, where Minnick was waiting on the back post to pop the puck into the net, cutting the deficit in half. The goal, a power-play goal, was just the fourth goal allowed by Cornell penalty killers this season.

Cornell, the tournament's top seed and playing its first-ever home playoff game, improved to 1-14 all-time in post-season games.

Cornell and Colgate will play game two of the best-of-three series on Saturday afternoon at 2 p.m. at Lynah Rink. A Cornell win would send the Big Red to the semifinals of the league championship, which would be played on Friday at Lynah Rink, while a Colgate win would force a decisive game three on Sunday at 2 p.m.