When Concordia Stingers women’s hockey coach Les Lawton looks back at his team’s play this weekend, he will admit that the team deserved the two of four possible points they earned in games against the Carleton Ravens and the Ottawa Gee Gees.
However, it was actually the game they lost – a 3-1 against the Gee Gees Sunday afternoon – that Lawton feels the team performed better in. Their 5-1 win against the Ravens on Saturday was misleading.
The team took advantage of Carleton rookie goaltender Katrina Giuliani’s first start by scoring five times, including four power play goals, on 27 shots. The Ravens fired 43 times at Stingers goaltender Meggy Hatin-Léveillée, scoring only once.
“We should have gotten two points we got this weekend,” said Lawton. “But, the scores aren’t indicative of the way we played in either game,” he said, emphasizing that the team played better in the loss.
On Sunday, Ottawa opened the scoring on the power play when Joelle Charlebois made a beautiful feed across the crease to Corliss Bean, who put the puck past a helpless Hatin-Léveillée. Charlebois’s pass was flipped over a defender’s stick before hitting Bean’s stick.
The Stingers bounced back less than a minute later. Donna Ringrose forced a turnover at the Ottawa blue line and moved in with two defenders chasing her. Ringrose, in close, didn’t get all of the puck but Bianca Chartrand dove in and put the puck past a surprised Gee Gee goaltender, Melissa Dipetta.
“I have no idea what happened,” Chartrand said. “She [Ringrose] shot it and I went to look for the rebound and the goalie wasn’t close to the net,” she said.
The game remained tied at 1-1 throughout the rest of the first period and most of the second. The first half of the second period was filled with Concordia scoring chances, but they couldn’t capitalize.
A power play that scored four goals on seven chances against Carleton created several scoring chances against Ottawa but the Stingers failed to put the puck in the net.
Their best chance was probably a three-part play that started with a Rose Healy shot from the point, tipped in the slot by Devon Rich with the puck going directly to Tawnya Danis but Dipetta was able to get across the crease to make the save.
“Our power play looked good [Sunday],” Lawton said. “We just didn’t get the puck in the net.”
The Gee Gees took the lead late at 15:21 of the second period when Mandi Duhamel won an offensive zone face off to defenceman Danika Smith, who scored on a screened shot from the point.
Concordia had a great opportunity to pull even early in the third period, following a penalty to Ashley Burril for body checking. However, while shorthanded an Ottawa dump-in was badly played by Hatin-Léveillée and recovered by a Gee Gee forechecker.
Hatin-Léveillée hurried a pass to a Stinger defender before the defender was stripped of the puck by Taryn Brown. Brown then had an easy short-handed goal as she put the puck past a desperate save attempt by the Stingers goaltender who was still out of the net.
Brown’s goal at 2:13 of the period demoralized the Stingers and Ottawa, who play very well with a lead, held on for the victory without much trouble from Concordia.
“When you let them score when you’re on the power play it kills the momentum,” said Chartrand. “When it goes from a one-goal game to a two-goal game it’s hard to get back into it,” she said.
“I liked the effort today,” Lawton said. “They had two goals where the bounce went their way, and we had chances like that as well – we just didn’t put them in the net,” he said.
In Saturday’s game, Catherine Rancourt scored the first two goals of her Stinger career. Angela Di Stasi, Devon Rich and Tawnya Danis also scored for Concordia. Danis added two assists while Donna Ringrose and Catherine Desjardins also picked up two assists each.
The Stingers are now preparing for their final game of the semester before the Christmas break.
They will take on their cross-town rivals, No. 1 McGill, on Saturday at the Ed Meagher arena. Puck drop is at 2:30 p.m.
