The last time fans saw the St. Thomas University (STU) women’s hockey team is when they took on the St. Francis Xavier (STFX) X-Women in the semifinals of the Atlantic University Sport (AUS) playoffs.
The game did not go STU’s way, being defeated 4-0, prematurely ending the team’s bid for nationals.
Fast Forward almost seven months, the team has shifted their focus to the new AUS season.
The season began on Oct. 4 against the University of Prince Edward Island (UPEI) Panthers. During the game, the Panthers jumped out to an early 2-0 lead.
However, the Panthers’ lead was cut in half when Tristyn Endicott, Tommies rookie defenseman, fired a shot from the blue line that snuck past the goalie.
Later on, the Panthers scored one in the second period, taking a 3-1 lead into the intermission. The Tommies battled back in the third, scoring a pair of goals to tie the game and send it to overtime, including one from sophomore forward Nadia Lavoie.
In overtime, team captain Ekaterina Pelowich put the puck over the goalie’s shoulder, sealing the comeback win.
“I don’t want to say nerve-wracking, but there’s always some pressure going into overtime.” said Pelowich. “Starting overtime, it’s always, ‘keep it simple.’ I had my left winger, Nadia, with me and Amber Daley was out there with me as well and we did it against Mount Allison in preseason.”
The next day, the team took on the STFX X-Women. Unfortunately, the game ended in a 2-0 loss, thanks to a pair of lucky bounces.
“I think we were looking at trying to get three points out of that weekend at minimum. But we got two and we were very close to the third point getting into overtime and then, possibly getting a win in overtime,” said Peter Murphy, the head coach of the STU women’s hockey team.
Murphy said it was a good start to the season, but is not sure if the team is satisfied with the opening weekend.
Leading up to the start of the regular season, the team made some changes to their roster. The team brought in seven recruits and transfers to complement the 17 returnees from last season.
According to Murphy, some of the newcomers were brought in to play “specific roles” on the team.
“We brought in a couple of [players] on the back end … we needed quarterbacks for our power play and we have two that have come in and we use one in each of the groups,” said Murphy. “So, that was a difference, we needed to get more pucks down from the point. They were able to do that [on] five-on-five as well.”
Angela Wisniewski is a communications and public policy professor at STU. She is also a loyal fan of the women’s hockey team and has been since 2019. She first began coming to games because she was “curious” about the students on the team whom she taught.
“Oh, man, it’s just so much fun … You never know how things are going to play out and it’s always very emotional to follow along with it, whether we’re doing well or coming from behind,” said Wisniewski “So, I guess a big piece of it is that it is so involving. It’s so much fun to watch and so exciting.”
Wisniewski said she thought the team look great in the season opener despite a win and a loss.
“I’m really struck by how fast they are, how smart they are as players. It was just an impressive weekend and a fun weekend to be out as a fan.”
