ITHACA, N.Y. – The No. 6 women's hockey team had much to much to celebrate on Saturday as the team dominated Brown in a 6-1 win on Senior Day. The victory was especially sweet for the seniors,
Sarah Knee,
Erin O'Connor and
Brianna Veerman, who all played their final regular season home game at Lynah Rink.
"I thought it was a solid effort all around," said Knee. "I didn't think we got the start that we wanted – and same with yesterday – but I was really proud of the way in the second and third period that everyone came together to make the game happen and get the win."
After going into the first intermission with a 1-0 advantage, Cornell lit the lamp five times in the second to surge ahead to the triumph. Twelve different skaters all registered at least one point in the contest. The last time this occurred was on Jan. 31, 2014 in a 6-3 win over Yale.
"Again tonight I thought we got off to a bit of a slow start, which is going to have to improve if we're going to have success in the playoffs," said head coach
Doug Derraugh. "But again, got it going a little bit better in the second and third periods. I thought we put a lot of pressure on them, particularly in the second period and finished on our chances better tonight than we did yesterday. So that's going to be important going into the playoff stretch here."
Grace Graham got things going for the team nine minutes and 51 seconds into the first period. After Knee launched off a shot from the left point, the Bears' starting goaltender, Calla Isaac, failed to retain possession of the puck. Before Isaac could cover it up, Graham skated into action, punching in the rebound for the score.
The Big Red's second period outburst was kick started by a game winner from
Paige Lewis 4:29 in. Lewis scooped up a loose puck in front of the net and sent in a nifty backhander to the far side of the net.
Maddie Mills and
Joie Phelps extended the lead to 4-0 with goals just 1:53 apart from each other.
Mills notched her seventh power play goal of the year just nine seconds into the man advantage. Following point-to-point passing from Knee and
Jaime Bourbonnais, Bourbonnais dished out a pass to Mills in the slot and the freshman tipped it in for her 16th score of the season. Mills is now tied for third in the nation with her power play tally (7).
The team would head into the second intermission with a 6-0 advantage thanks to more lamp lighting action from
Finley Frechette and
Willow Slobodzian. Frechette notched her first-career goal off of a little give-and-go action between her and
Pippy Gerace. Gerace fed the freshman one last time right in front of the net and beat Brown's Julianne Landry, who came into relieve Isaac.
Slobodzian netted Cornell's final goal of the day with 1:03 remaining in the period. The freshman did some fancy maneuvering from the left point, crossing over into the right circle and finally sending in a shot for the squad's sixth score.
"It's sad because I feel like I'm leaving a great group of girls behind," said Knee. "But at the same time I'm very proud and I know that the group that I'm leaving is going to carry on in the best way possible. They all have really good attitudes, they're skilled, they have good character, and if you have that, you can have a great team every year. So that's exciting from my end of things."
Brown would eventually get on the board 17 seconds into the third with Kaitijane Blumberg going coast-to-coast before laying one on Cornell goaltender
Lindsay Browning, who came into relief for Marlene Boissonnault.
It was yet another offensive clinic put on by the Big Red with the team taking 52 shots on goal in comparison to the Bears' 14. Boissonnault made 11 saves in 40 minutes of action while Browning had two in 20. Isaac hauled in 25 stops for Brown in 28:35 between the pipes, Landry had 21 in 31:25.
Cornell closes out the regular season on the road, traveling to Union and Rensselaer. The Big Red and the Dutchwomen will go head-to-head on Friday, Feb. 16 at 6 p.m. The game against the Engineers in scheduled for Saturday, Feb. 17 at 3 p.m.
