It was exciting, physical, frustrating and ended in yet another split series for the Wisconsin women’s hockey team.
After a thrilling 5-3 win over the St. Cloud State Huskies on Friday, the Badgers came out Saturday hoping to get their second sweep of the season only to fall 4-3 in the second game, resulting in their seventh split series of the season.
Friday’s win was highlighted by sophomore forward Carolyne Prevost’s hat trick, leading to the Badgers’ momentum going into Saturday.
But SCSU also wanted a win on the weekend, making the game more physical than the night before.
Things were looking good for the Badgers as sophomore forward Brooke Ammerman scored a power play goal assisted by freshmen defensemen Stefanie McKeough and Saige Pacholok.
The Huskies were not going to leave the first period without their own say, however, scoring with 13 seconds left.
St. Cloud also struck quickly in the second — three minutes in, freshman Lisa Martinson was able to knock the puck past UW goaltender Becca Ruegsegger in what looked like a complete pile up in front of the net.
Despite struggling with power play goals this season, the Badgers were able to get another one as Mallory Deluce capitalized off assists from Ammerman and Pacholok only a minute later.
“It’s definitely a positive what we can take away from the game with our power play,” Deluce said. “We scored two goals today off of them. We’ve been struggling in the past with power plays, so it’s been looking good now.
“That’s something we can take away from the game as a positive.”
The Huskies weren’t ready to settle on a tie and found the back of the net again as Roberts took advantage on another power play.
Wisconsin came out in the third period down 3-2 before Decker tied it up on a shorthanded goal assisted by Prevost.
“Prevost picked off the pass, she set it up to me, I knew the goalie was coming out so I decided to get in on my back hand,” Decker said. “It was great. I knew what the goalie was thinking and I knew she was coming out to take the shots away so it was nice to finally get one in.”
As the offensive battle continued, the Huskies later took the lead for good.
With five minutes left, SCSU’s Meaghan Pezon slid the puck past Ruegsegger.
Friday night, junior defender Geena Prough set the Badgers out on the right track, scoring in the sixth minute from the slot off assists from Emily Kranz and Anne Dronen.
“I was just trying to get in a good scoring area and I got a nice pass from the point and I just spun around and shot it in,” Prough said. “I knew we had to get this goalie moving.”
A minute later, Deluce scored off an assist from Ammerman, giving the Badgers the best start they’ve seen all season, scoring two goals off of only six shots on goal.
Interim head coach Tracey DeKeyser was pleased to have the 2-0 lead after the first period.
“The most important thing is we came out strong,” DeKeyser said. “To go back into the locker room after the first period with two goals, that was extremely important just to get momentum working in our favor. That was one of our goals.”
In the second period, SCSU cut UW’s lead in half as senior forward Holly Roberts scored an unassisted shorthanded goal five minutes in. The game became more physical, but the Badgers stayed cool under the Huskies’ pressure.
Seventeen minutes in, Prevost extended Wisconsin’s lead 3-1, scoring from the crease.
“I was trying to get it out of our end and then I chipped a pass to the first defensemen,” Prevost said. “I had someone almost pulling me down and I saw [Prough] on the far side and I just made it to her.
“Then she had a nice pass to [Deluce] who just missed it and it went right to my stick for the open net.”
SCSU was quick to respond.
A minute and a half later senior forward Felicia Nelson scored the first of four St. Cloud power play goals on the series.
The Huskies still kept fighting back again, cutting the Badger lead 4-3 off another Nelson goal in the eighth minute. But Prevost was not going to let the Huskies have the last word.
Only three minutes later she completed her first career hat trick, assisted by Kelly Nash and Deluce, sealing a Wisconsin victory.
Prevost credited her hat trick to being in the right place at the right time.
Even with the win, the physical game still provided lessons for the team.
The Badgers took 15 penalties in the game, and DeKeyser noted many were unnecessary penalties and how they have to learn from them.
“We don’t need to go in the box unnecessarily and we did that twice,” DeKeyser said. “We went to the box twice and got scored on twice. We’ve got to live and learn from it.” Ammerman placed the blame for Saturday’s loss on the team itself, and the amount of penalties they take.
“We’ve had a rough go of it — most of it’s our fault, we’ve got to take responsibility for that, we have to be better,” Ammerman said. “We take a lot of penalties, we have a pretty bad reputation.
“We’re haunting ourselves and getting ourselves out of games.”
