Women's Hockey Opens Season With 1-1 Tie

Loses in Shootout



by Kai Barner

The Boston University women’s ice hockey team was within 7 minutes of securing a 1-0 victory in their season opener over the tenacious visiting Ohio State Buckeyes, when sophomore defenseman Carly Warren (’12) was whistled for cross-checking.

“I didn’t like a couple things we were doing – we were playing just a little bit loose, getting on the offensive side of the situation instead of the defensive side,” BU head coach Brian Durocher said. “I thought maybe [after] we had the timeout (with 7:07 to play) we were going to weather the storm.”

The call against Warren ('12) brought the Terriers’ penalty kill back to the ice for their seventh outing of the evening, which included three shorthanded situations in the first 12 minutes of play. Although the unit had performed quite admirably in their dismissal of the Buckeyes’ first six power plays, Ohio State freshman forward Minttu Tuominen was able to let loose a shot from the left point with 19 seconds left on the man-advantage. Senior goalie Melissa Haber (’10) was screened on the play and unable to track the puck as it deflected off of Buckeye sophomore forward Melissa Feste and in for the tying goal with 5:06 left in regulation.

“We just had a few too many penalty kills to deal with,” Durocher said, “I don’t mind penalties once in a while, but we had a couple of questionable ones in the first period where we didn’t use good discretion. And the [last] one was for checking, which is not always a part of the game.”

Terriers junior forward Lauren Cherewyk (’11), who was third on the team last year with 13 goals, recorded the first goal of the season early in the second period. Warren was able to corral a loose puck in the BU zone and pass it up to junior forward Jillian Kirchner (’11), who then hit Cherewyk (’11) in stride while she raced up the left side. Cherewyk pulled the trigger as she crossed into the left circle and beat Ohio State freshmen netminder Chelsea Knapp, who played an otherwise sensational game and recorded 24 saves on the night.

The 1-1 tie would hold through the end of the third period and the five minutes of overtime, and that is how it will be officially recorded even though Ohio State won the shootout 2-1. Haber (27 saves) stopped the first Buckeyes shooter, sophomore forward Kim Theut, but fellow sophomore forward Natalie Spooner and Tuominen were both able to subsequently score. BU senior forward Jonnie Bloemers (’10) was the lone Terrier shooter to beat Knapp, who smothered the other two attempts by senior forward Laurel Koller (’10) and junior forward Holly Lorms (’11).

Hockey East and the WCHA, Ohio State’s home conference, both introduced shootouts before the start of last season to break ties in regular-season conference games. Shootout wins would count toward a team’s conference standing and have an effect on seeding for the conference’s postseason tournament, but by rule such games would still be considered ties in official NCAA records and thus have no affect on determining the national tournament field. Since Ohio State-BU is a non-conference match up, the result will only appear on the overall NCAA record as a tie.

When asked about the key to coming back and beating Ohio State in the second leg of the two-game series, Durocher said that the team would have to bring the same intensity and take better advantage of power play opportunities after going 0-for-6 with the man-advantage.

“We had a couple of great eight to ten minute sequences in [each period] where we could’ve put this thing away. But we didn’t,” Durocher reasoned.

The Terriers and Buckeyes will return to the ice Saturday at 3 p.m. Coverage on WTBU will begin at 2:40, so be sure to tune in and find out how each squad responds to the dissatisfaction of settling for a tie to kick off the 2009-10 season.