Down and Out
Women's hockey swept by St. Cloud State, drop into tie for sixth place in WCHA.
by Dan Myers
February 14, 2006
One could sense the wheels falling off the Mavericks’ season.
After falling to St. Cloud State 1-0 last Friday at All Seasons Arena, the Minnesota State women’s hockey team trailed by the same margin entering the second period Saturday. At the 11:44 mark of the middle frame, a power-play goal by SCSU’s Ashley Stewart made the game 2-0 in the Huskies favor. Within four minutes, two more Husky goals had given St. Cloud State a 4-0 lead.
Danelle Maguet’s tally at 14:32 and Marie-Michel Lemieux’s just over a minute later ended any hope of an MSU comeback and put a cap on a critical sweep for both teams, as the surging Huskies all but nailed down home-ice in the first round of the WCHA playoffs with 1-0 and 6-1 wins over the Mavericks.
“It definitely took a toll on us,” said Mavericks forward Amanda Stohr. “They kept putting pucks in the net and we couldn’t buy a goal.”
Entering the series, MSU had held the Huskies scoreless in their previous two match-ups at the National Hockey Center last November. The 2-0 and 3-0 victories marked the last time the Mavericks have earned a sweep this season. Since then, they have won just two games, compared to SCSU’s 12 wins.
It didn’t take long for the Huskies to break out of their scoreless trend.
Maguet scored the only goal of Friday’s game just 3:50 into the first period. From there Huskies’ net minder Lauri St. Jacques stopped all 22 Maverick shots en route to her second shutout in a week, her first being a Feb. 4 blanking of top-ranked Wisconsin.
“I’m in that zone,” St. Jacques said. “I’m just seeing the puck well and the team is playing well in front of me.”
Saturday’s drubbing was also a solid display of goaltending by St. Jacques as she stopped 26 more shots for the victory. If not for Maverick freshman Maggie Fisher’s late goal, St. Jacques may have earned yet another shut-out.
“Because we’re not scoring a lot, we are forcing things and trying to make the perfect play instead of just getting the puck to the net and hoping for a rebound,” said MSU head coach Jeff Vizenor. “Right now, we just need to get the puck to the net and see what happens.”
Leading the Huskies offensively, Hailey Clarkson scored SCSU’s fifth goal at 4:18 of the third and added helpers on two others.
Even after Fisher broke the shutout streak with just 4:20 left to play, SCSU won the ensuing face-off and scored its sixth goal just 10 seconds later.
“That’s just how things have been going for us,” Stohr said. “We worked so hard to get one in the net and finally do it, then they come down and do it easily. It’s kind of hard to fight through.”
MSU has fallen from the third spot into a tie with Bemidji State for sixth spot in the WCHA. The Mavs now stand one point behind Ohio State, whom the Beavers swept in Columbus this past weekend. With two weekends to go, including series at Wisconsin and hosting Minnesota-Duluth — the top two teams in the conference — the Mavericks are faced with a daunting trip to Duluth for the playoffs, a place where MSU has never won in program history.
“It’s a must win; it’s always a must win for us when you have put yourself in the position we have,” Stohr said. “If we can get any momentum going, it will really help our situation.”
MSU travels to Wisconsin this weekend for a series against the Badgers at the Kohl Center. A sweep for UW secures the WCHA regular season title and the No. 1 seed in the conference playoffs.