The ninth-ranked women's ice hockey team (4-3, 3-2 ECAC) picked up a win and a pair of losses this week, splitting away games against ECAC and Ivy League rivals No. 8 Princeton and Yale, before coming home to lose to No. 4 Harvard on Tuesday night.
Brown kept it close with Princeton but fell to the Tigers 3-2 on Friday. The next day against Yale, the Bears continued their 16-year winning streak against the Bulldogs with a 4-1 victory. In the final Ivy match of the week, the Bears hosted Harvard, managing a score of 3-0 before losing 7-3.
Princeton and Brown showed how evenly matched they were in a close showdown. The Bears swept Princeton in last season's ECAC quarterfinals, so the Tigers had a chip on their shoulder. "I think we were the better team, but they worked harder than us, and we missed some chances," said Head Coach Digit Murphy. "We beat ourselves."
For most of the first two periods, the Brown offense had several chances but could not connect. The Tigers opened scoring two minutes into the first period and were up 2-0 halfway through the second.
"They came out with more energy than us, and we made a couple of bad defensive plays," said co-captain Amy McLaughlin '05.
Bruno rallied in the 17th minute on a power play goal from Christine Holdredge '07, but the Tigers came back early in the third with another even-strength goal. With a couple of minutes left in the game, Princeton took a penalty and the Bears pulled goalie Stacy Silverman '08, creating a 6-on-4 situation. Capitalizing on the advantage, Keaton Zucker '06 passed to McLaughlin, who rocketed the puck from the blue line into the Princeton net. But that goal wasn't enough for the Bears, and the final score remained 3-2.
On Friday night, the Yale Bulldogs finally broke their 20-year losing streak against Harvard. But they could not exorcise the same demons against Brown the following night, allowing Brown to extend its winning streak.
The Bears came out strong in the first period, and their flurry of shooting led to a power play goal by Myria Heinhuis '06, who redirected a McLaughlin shot. Later in the first, emerging rookies Rylee Olewinski '08 and Heather Lane '08 beat Yale goalie Sarah Love for a 2-0 lead.
After Bulldog Sheila Zingler cut Bruno's lead to one in the second period, Zucker secured the win with two goals in the next two periods.
O'Hara Shipe '08 was strong in the net for Brown, turning away 24 of 25 shots.
"We played much better on the second day," Murphy said, adding that both games had their upsides. Though losing three players to injury left a void in the team, "a good thing we can take out of (the Princeton game) is that a lot of the players are stepping up," Murphy said. She said she was especially pleased with the play of Zucker, Heinhuis and McLaughlin, and with the rookies' contributions.
The Princeton game was difficult because of the high number of penalties, which disrupted the Brown offense, Murphy said. The Bears are still adapting to the new refereeing regulations in college hockey, which mandate more tightly called games. "If you looked at the flow of the game, there was none," Murphy said.
Tuesday, the Bears jumped to an early lead against Harvard, going up 3-0, but could not hold it and lost, 7-3.
"The momentum shifted and we didn't respond - that is all there is to it," Murphy said. "It's a learning curve. It is early in the season, but I'm not happy. Seven unanswered goals is an embarrassment."
In the first period the Bears came out strong, stymieing the Crimson's controlled offense with sheer aggressiveness and taking an early lead. The Bears scored two minutes in, during a 5-on-3 power play, when Keaton Zucker '06 put a shot in from low on the right side.
Five minutes later, Krissy McManus '05 found Kathryn Moos '07 on the lower left side for Brown's second goal of the evening. But Moos was not satisfied with a single goal, and at 8:52 she wrapped around the goal to score unassisted, bringing the score to 3-0.
The game was not over, though, as Harvard came right back up the ice to score - Julie Chu got Harvard on the board. Harvard kept up pressure on the Brown defense and it paid off at 13:43 when Jennifer Sifers put the puck past Shipe, bringing the score to 3-2.
Brown picked up its play, and it seemed like Bruno would retain the lead, but bad luck got in the way. Caitlin Cahow put a slap shot from the line that went between Shipe's thighs and sent the game into intermission tied at 3.
"I think that it wasn't the defense's fault - we just stopped playing with energy," Murphy said. "We stopped moving our feet, we stopped doing all the little things that we were doing right in the first 10 minutes of the game, which was going hard, going often, going at it, (and) playing intensely."
Harvard came out with renewed energy in the second period, and key players stepped up early. Near the three-minute mark, Sarah Vaillancourt picked up the puck off her skate low on the left and instantly found Nicole Corriero across the goal, who netted the shot before Shipe could react. The four unanswered goals led Murphy to pull Shipe from the game.
The Bears' slide continued when Myria Heinhuis '06 received a penalty for cross checking at 8:42. Despite a few close calls, Brown successfully killed the power play, but Zucker received a penalty 22 seconds later for interference. Corriero scored for Harvard at 11:20 with a shot into the top of the net, giving the Crimson a 5-3 lead.
Brown came out strong in the third period and dominated the first few minutes, but everything changed at 9:06 when Corriero shook off three defenders and forced a goal past Silverman, bringing the score to 6-3.
Shortly afterwards, Glennon went to the penalty box for boarding and the Crimson quickly capitalized. Corriero scored her fourth goal of the evening to make the score 7-3.
"It is really hard to keep those Olympians contained," Murphy said. "You're up 3-0, you have to play very, very disciplined, and you can't get in the box. You can't give them space and we did. Clearly we weren't up for the task tonight."
The Bears continue their season this Friday when they host Clarkson University at 7 p.m. in Meehan Auditorium.
