The St. Thomas women’s hockey team dropped the second game of the three game series against the Dalhousie Tigers Thursday night. They lost 3-2.
“Dal came to play,” said team captain Kelty Apperson. “Their goaltending was strong.”
Going into the game the Tommies had the advantage, with a 1-0 series lead. The Tommies won game one 7-3 Tuesday night in Fredericton.
Dalhousie struck first with 14:27 left in the first period to take their first lead of the series. It didn’t last.
Lauren Henman, who had four goals in game one, got right back to where she left off, scoring with 2:46 left in the period. Then, with only 24 seconds left, the Tommies took the lead with a goal from Myfanwy Thomson.
After the first period, the Tommies had a 2-1 lead. That was the only period the Tommies would finish with the lead, because Dalhousie started to take control.
With 14 minutes left in the second period, Dalhousie scored the game tying goal in a power play. Dalhousie had six power play opportunities, and that was the only one they capitalized on. The Tommies had three power plays but didn’t score off of them.
“It was hard to get our momentum under us because of the amount of penalties,” said Apperson. “We would gain momentum and then have to be shorthanded for two minutes and kill it and then get back in it again.”
Going into the third period, the game was still tied. Then, halfway through the third, the Tigers took their first lead since the first period off of an unassisted goal from Elizabeth MacArthur. Though the Tommies had some close shots late in the third, none of them found the back of the net.
Though Dalhousie finished with the most goals, STU had more shots. STU had 41 shots on goal while Dalhousie had 26.
“We just didn’t finish as much as we should of. We had a lot of opportunities that we should of capitalized on,” said Apperson.
The third and deciding game is Saturday night in Fredericton at the Grant Harvey Centre. The winner will move on to the semi-final round of the AUS playoffs.
“We know how to take this loss and use it as fuel on Saturday,” said Apperson.
