Saints Hold off Dartmouth on “Senior Day,” Draw Clarkson in Playoffs

Feb. 20: The St. Lawrence University women's hockey team's Class of 2010 left Appleton Arena in style on Saturday afternoon, as the Saints held off Dartmouth 4-3 in the regular season finale.  The Saints, who celebrated "Senior Day" for the seven classmates, finish the year as the No. 7 seed in the ECAC Hockey standings and will travel to Potsdam, NY next week for a best-of-three series with archrival Clarkson in the tournament quarterfinals.

St. Lawrence improved to 15-12-7 (11-8-3) on the year and will be on the road in the opening round of the tournament for the first time next weekend.  Meanwhile, Dartmouth's season comes to an end at 12-14-2 (9-12-1), as Colgate University used a 3-2 win to pass the Big Green and earn the No. 8 seed.

The Saints owned the opening two periods of the game, as they managed to outshoot Dartmouth handedly in both the first and second frames.  Junior Kirsten Roach opened the scoring at 11:31 when she knocked a loose puck in the crease past Big Green netminder Mariel Lacina after rookie Jamie Goldsmith set the play up by driving to the net.  Sophomore Vanessa Emond then put the Scarlet and Brown up 2-0 at 15:55 when she ripped a one-timer from outside the left circle past a screened Lacina for her 15^th of the year.  Senior assistant captains Courtney Sawchuk and Britni Smith assisted on the goal.

"I thought we gave a good effort and came out strong in the first period to set the tone," said St. Lawrence head coach Chris Wells.  "We settled in and got a few timely goals."

Those goals continued in the second period, as the Saints opened up a 3-0 lead midway through the stanza.  Junior Lauren Brozowski scored her first collegiate goal 9:17 into the second, as the Concord, MA native batted a rebound behind Lacina for the three-goal cushion.  Junior Michelle Zimmerman took the initial shot and was credited with her second helper of the game, while senior captain Tara Akstull also earned an assist on the goal.

Though Dartmouth's Sarah Parsons scored a highlight-reel goal at 12:24 to cut the Big Green's deficit back to two, first-year student Kayla Sullivan responded only 1:52 later on the power play to put the home team up 4-1.  Parsons got the visitors on the board when she managed to score on a breakaway after falling to her knees, using a slick move to elude St. Lawrence senior goalie Brittony Chartier.  However, Sullivan came right back and jammed the puck into the net for her 12^th goal of the year at 14:16.

Dartmouth's Geneva Kliman would set the tone for the third period, though, when she scored at 16:26 to give her team hope trailing by only two.  Kliman blasted a shot from the blue line that beat Chartier's glove for her first of the season.

Despite being outshot 21-12 through two periods, the third was owned by the visitors as they played for their playoff life.  Dartmouth, which outshot St. Lawrence 20-5 in the frame, pulled to within one only 1:42 in when Kelly Foley scored another acrobatic goal for the visitors.  This time, Foley backhanded a shot from her backside inside the right post that Chartier never saw nor expected for her third goal of the year.  Sarah Toupal and Sally Komarek assisted on the play that made it 4-3.

The Saints, needing to buckle down, called a timeout at 7:20 of the third to regroup and curb the momentum.  Dartmouth continued to pound away at Chartier, though, and forced the Saskatoon, SK native to make 19 saves in the period.  Though the Big Green opted to pull Lacina with a 1:35 remaining and kept the puck in the home team's zone throughout the rest of regulation, they were unable to score the tying goal.

"It's always difficult to end a team's season, and they obviously took it to us in the third," added Coach Wells.  "Brittony (Chartier) made some big saves down the stretch to earn the win."

 Dartmouth finished with a 32-26 advantage in shots on goal, while Chartier finished with 29 saves to Lacina's 22.  The Saints were 1-for-1 on the power play, while Dartmouth finished 0-for-1.

Following the game, all seven members of the Saints' Class of 2010 were recognized including Akstull, Smith, Sawchuk, Chartier, Maxie Weisz, Becky Street and Karlee Shields.

The 2010 ECAC Hockey Tournament Quarterfinals begin next week, with dates and times to be announced.  The conference's regular season champions, the Cornell Big Red, will host travel-partner Colgate.  St. Lawrence will face Clarkson in a rematch of last year's quarterfinals, though this year will take place at Cheel Arena.  The other two quarterfinal series will be between Ivy League schools No. 3 Harvard and No. 6 Princeton and two upstart programs in No. 4 Quinnipiac and No. 5 Rensselaer.