The Quinnipiac Bobcats women’s ice hockey team (11-1-3, 5-1-2 ECAC) defeated the Dartmouth Big Green (4-4-2, 4-1-2 ECAC) 7-1. Their performance was backed by a lethal power play that scored three power play goals tonight on the five opportunities, and another stellar outing from junior goaltender, Sydney Rossman.
Rossman, coming off four straight shutouts, finally surrendered her first goal in 4 games with a strong wrist shot from Dartmouth co-captain Laura Stacey. The goal by Stacey ended Rossman’s shutout streak at 296:42 minutes, the program’s longest ever.
“We have had a long history of great goaltenders here,” Quinnipiac head coach Cassandra Turner said. “For her to be the one that owns that record, it was a neat thing for [Rossman] and a neat thing for our team”
Quinnipiac opened up the scoring when the Bobcats found themselves on the power play just three minutes into the game. Kristen Tamberg took in a pass from Taryn Baumgardt and rifled it past Dartmouth’s goalie, Robyn Chemago, for the Bobcat’s first power play goal of the night. But they didn’t stop there.
After the second straight penalty on Lindsey Allen gave the Bobcats another man advantage, Baumgardt rifled one from the point that found the back of the net to extend the Bobcats lead to two. With just half a minute left in the first Nicole Connery fed a beautiful cross-ice pass to Taylar Ciafarano who did the rest. Ciafarano shot the puck five hole and got it past Chemago, giving the bobcats a 3-0 lead and notching her team-leading 16th goal of the season.
The Bobcats followed up an offense barrage in the first period with another one in the second. The first goal of period came from Baumgardt, who notched her second goal of the game on the team’s third power play of the evening.
“We spend a lot of time on our power play,” Turner said. “[Ardito] did a great job on the power play and working on that and it showed today.”
Just over a minute after the Baumgardt goal, Emma Greco came around the net and looked for a wrap-around goal but was stopped by Chemago. However, Randi Marcon was there to gather the free puck and deposit it in the back of the net to push the Bobcats lead to five.
After a second period that was filled with penalties on both sides and with just a little over a minute to play in that middle stanza, Melissa Samoskevich tallied her sixth goal of the season to give the Bobcats the 6-1 lead after two. The Connecticut native notched another one in the final period to solidify the Bobcats 7-1 lead.
“We just want to take it one game at a time, one day a time,” Quinnipiac captain Cydney Roesler about tomorrow’s game. “Were in the moment and then in a short while we will flush it and look forward to tomorrow.”
Quinnipiac will pick back up the action tomorrow as the Bobcats welcome in the #No. 7 Harvard Crimson for a matinee matchup between two top ten USCHO ranked teams at 4 p.m.at the High Point Solutions Arena.
