Women’s hockey falls in exhibition match with Blades

The No. 6 Boston University women’s ice hockey team took to Walter Brown Arena on Saturday for an exhibition contest against the Boston Blades of the Canadian Women’s Hockey League.

It was a highly contested matchup, with the Terriers (1-1) outshooting their opponents 35 to 24, but it would be the Blades who came away with a 5-3 victory.

“I thought it was a real entertaining hockey game,” said BU coach Brian Durocher. “Both teams went back and forth. I thought our team, after the maybe first 10 minutes, really got their legs under them and played with good energy.”

The Blades opened the scoring in the final minute of the first period, as former Cornell University defenseman Alyssa Gagliardi beat sophomore goaltender Victoria Hanson to put her team on the board. With intermission to regroup, the Terriers came out and tied the game just 1:20 into the second frame when sophomore winger Samantha Sutherland found the back of the net against Blades goalie and Canadian Women’s National Team member Genevieve Lacasse.

However, about a minute and a half later, the Blades’ Megan Myers gave her team the lead again with 16:04 left in the period.

BU was given a real chance to knot the game again when, in the span of 13 seconds, former Terriers Tara Watchorn and Kaleigh Fratkin for the Blades were sent to the penalty box for interference and boarding, respectively. BU would eventually cash in on the 5-on-3, as Sutherland potted her second goal of the game with help from senior defenseman Shannon Doyle and senior captain Marie-Philip Poulin.

If Saturday was meant to be a test of Terrier special teams, they were certainly given enough chances to work their way through both the penalty kill and the power play. BU went to the box three times and was perfect on the penalty kill on the day. The Blades took five penalties throughout the contest, one of which BU put away, giving the Terriers opportunities abound to work with the puck on the man advantage.

“I just thought killing penalties, we were much more cohesive than we were last week,” Durocher said. “I thought that our focus was to try to be assertive, try to be aggressive, take time and space we had. I think today we did, and when you’ve got the kids [the Blades] out there on the power play, they’re pretty talented, and it takes working together, making the right reads.

“And on the power play, if we didn’t score, we moved around very well, lots of poise, so those were two of the real shining lights today.”

With about half the match expired, both sides changed goalies. Freshman goaltender Erin O’Neil took Hanson’s spot for the remainder of the contest, and University of Maine alum netminder Brittany Ott relieved Lacasse. The teams went into the third period tied at two apiece, with BU having outshot the Blades 18-5 during the middle stanza.

Four and a half minutes into the final frame, U.S. Olympian Hilary Knight regained the lead for the Blades on one of her game-high eight shots on the day. At 17:47, freshman center Victoria Bach tied the game up again on a pass from sophomore defenseman Sarah Steele.

It seemed as if they game would head into overtime, but Northeastern University-product Rachel Llanes threw one on net past O’Neil for the 4-3 tally with 46.9 seconds left in the game. The Terriers called a quick time out and pulled O’Neil for the extra skater, but with 17.9 seconds on the clock, Blades forward Casey Pickett sealed the win for the Blades with an empty net goal.

“Unfortunately, we found a way to let them get the last one, really the last two I guess to put the game away,” Durocher said. “But that’s a good team. There’s a lot of real top ex-college hockey players, some Olympians in the lineup and that will make us better as the year goes on.”

Even with the loss, Durocher was able to better examine players who had not been given as much playing time as others, and was overall impressed with their performances noting that what he saw on Saturday will help the team continue to compete internally for spots.

“That will help us depth-wise, fighting for the positions, getting in the lineup, whatever it is,” he said. “There are great strides made in a game like today.”