HAMILTON – Breanne Wilson-Bennett (Markham, Ontario) and Malia Schneider (Millarville, Alberta) each scored a pair of goals Saturday afternoon as the No. 5/5 Colgate women’s ice hockey team clinched its third sweep of the season with a 4-1 win over Mercyhurst at Class of 1965 Arena.
With the victory, the Raiders improve to 6-0-0 to open up a season for the first time in program history. Colgate’s six-game winning streak is also tied for the second longest in program history.
The Raiders and Lakers were tied after each of the first tow periods of play and each team managed to score just one goal through the first 40 minutes until the Raiders offensive explosion in the third period.
Wilson-Bennett put the Raiders on the board just 3:23 into the second period to break the scoreless tie with her second goal of31728 the season. Kaila Pinkney (Denfield, Ontario) passed the puck in the defensive zone to Wilson-Bennett to break out for the rush. She hit Zafuto with the pass on the right boards where Zafuto skated into the high slot and fired a shot that squeaked through Mercyhurst goaltender Sara McDonnell’s pads. The puck was sitting right in the crease where Wilson-Bennett crashed to bury the goal.
The Lakers responded over 11 minutes later with just 5:14 to go in the second period as Vilma Tanskanen scored Mercyhurst’s only goal of the game. Alexa Vasko worked the puck from behind the Raiders goal to Emma Nuutinen on the doorstep. Nuutinen played the puck across for Tanskanen who was able to be Colgate goaltender Julia Vandyk (Cambridge, Ontario).
Schneider regained Colgate’s lead nearly seven minutes into the third period and the Raiders never looked back. Shelby Perry (Elginburg, Ontario) skated the puck up the ice and fed Jessie Eldridge (Barrie, Ontario) with a pass at the blue line. Eldridge made a slick behind the back pass to Schneider who skated into open space just inside the right faceoff circle to wrist home the puck.
Colgate clung to its one-goal lead over the next 11 minutes before Wilson-Bennett buried her second goal of the game to make it 3-1. Megan Sullivan (Toronto, Ontario) wrapped the puck around the boards where Bailey Larson (Sycamore, Illinois) chased down the puck just to the left of the goal. Larson skated back up to the blue line before a fake overlap from Pinkney created space in the center of the zone for her. Larson wristed a shot that was knocked down but Wilson-Bennett crashed the goal once again to put home the loose puck.
Schneider closed out the scoring with 56.6 seconds to go in the final frame for her second tally of the night. The first-year blocked a Mercyhurst shot, gathered the rebound and chipped home the empty-net goal from center ice to make it 4-1 Raiders.
BOTTOM LINE
Colgate 4, Mercyhurst 1
WIN/LOSS RECORDS
The Raiders improve to 6-0-0 to open a season for the first time in program history while the Lakers fall to 1-6-1 on the season
KEY RAIDER INFO31729
-Colgate had two players score two goals in the same game for the first time since Feb. 10 when Shae Labbe (Calgary, Alberta) had a hat trick and Perry scored two goals
-Wilson-Bennett tallied her fifth career two-goal game and first since Dec. 3, 2016 against Harvard
-Saturday was also Wilson-Bennett’s 11th career multi-point game as she extended her point streak to three games
-Schneider recorded her first career two-goal game and second career two-point game as she extended her point streak to five games
-Perry’s assist on Saturday gives her five consecutive games with an assist, the longest point streak of her career, as she leads the team with seven helpers
-Eldridge extended her point streak to six games, the only player with a point in all six games, as she tallied an assist for her 10th point of the season
-Vandyk recorded 25 saves in her first start of the 2017-18 season
-With 32 career wins, Vandyk is tied with Jen Burtaw ’02 and Ashlynne Rando ’16 for the third most wins in program history. Rebecca Lahar ’05 owns the program record with 35 wins
-Pinkney extended her point streak to a career-best three games as the senior defender played in her 100th career game
-Larson and Zafuto each picked up assists in the game, with Zafuto’s going down as her third of the season while Larson’s was her first
FACTS AND FIGURES
-Shots were even Saturday afternoon at 26 apiece thanks to Colgate’s 12-5 third period advantage
-The Raiders netted the lone power-play goal of the afternoon going 1 for 8 with the advantage while Mercyhurst was 0 for 3
-Colgate had a slight advantage in faceoffs at 32-27 led by Wilson-Bennett’s game-high 11 wins
FROM THE SOURCE
Head Coach Greg Fargo
“I liked our response today, we were ready to play more so than yesterday but I have to give Mercyhurst a lot of credit; they are a tough team who is really physically and make it tough on your defense. They did a nice job to make it hard on us.”
“We did what we needed to do in the first half of the game and then in the third period we really dialed it up another level. We started competing harder and started to win some more of those 50/50 puck battles. That was the difference, we earned ourselves some good chances and made them count.”
“The message was pretty simple, we’re a team that likes the puck and feel good ourselves when we have it. All series long, they made it tough for us to do that so we had to tweak how we wanted to play a little bit and we knew were going to have to battle for what we got. We did a nice job of doing that in the third and that was the difference.”
“That’s the beauty of our team, everyday can be someone new that steps up. Bre’s been playing exceptionally well over the last couple weeks. You always know what you’re going to get from her, she’s going to outwork everybody and she was the benefactor of some hard-working shifts. She did things the right way and was rewarded for it tonight. For a freshman playing like a veteran, [Schneider’s] as the top of the point on the power play with a lot of responsibility and makes it look easy at times.”
“We have to be ready to play and we have to be willing to win different ways. We’re going to be in games like this weekend down the road, and as soon as next weekend potentially, so we just have to continue to learn and take those lessons with us. If we continue to get better all the time and continue to learn then we’re going to like where we’re at the end of the year.”
Senior Breanne Wilson-Bennett
“We really stepped it up as team tonight. The lines were switched up a bit and it was just clicking tonight. Both of my goals came from all five people on the ice, we stuck to our systems and when we do that it’s going to go in every time.”
“The message is always the same, and we always coming out trying to work as hard as we can. I won’t take anything away from them, they played very well and we had a few bounces go our way.”
“It’s always nice coming off a high but we know we have to have a really good week of practice and focus back in because we have the North Country. They’re going to bring it to us and we just have to keep playing our game and we’re going to be fine.”
UP NEXT
The Raiders open up ECAC Hockey play and hit the road for the first time next weekend with a trip to the North Country where they’ll face Clarkson on Friday night at 6 p.m. followed by St. Lawrence on Saturday at 3 p.m.
