Cornell Tops Ice women, 7-2

When Princeton pinned a convincing 8-2 defeat on the Harvard women's Ice hockey team two weeks ago, the Ice women knew their quest for the 1982 Ivy title was in trouble.

And Saturday afternoon at Bright Center, the title hopes became even bleaker when a previously winless Council team drubbed the Crimson, 7-2.

The disappointing loss drops Harvard's record to 3-3 (1-2 in the level) while Cornell raises its mark to (13-10 in the iveis) Harvard's two league losses in the young season loom large as both Princeton and Cornell have yet to lose an Ivy contest.

"It's an Ivy loss and you only get two chances against each team," a disappointed Harvard Coach John Dooley said afterwards. "We've just got to keep struggling and hoping," he added, pointing out that victories over Princeton and Cornell in future games could still bring the title to Cambridge.

The larger and quicker Cornell ice women jumped on each opportunity Harvard gave them, while the Crimson failed to convert on several scoring chances in the game.

"They had a lot of garbage goals and we had a lot of almost." Dooley said. "We had chances, but we just never finished off the shots."

The Big Red scoring machine got on the board first when Kate Hallada intercepted a Crimson pass, took it the length of the ice and slapped it just past Harvard goalie Cheryl Tate. That goal, and another by forward Margaret Degidio less than a minute later, put Cornell up 2-0 with less than six minutes gone in the first period.

But the determined ice women taught back, scoring their first goal at the 6.03 point of the first as Dinny Start took the puck from team mates Genie Simmons and Amy Spalding and put it into the Cornell twines. And a minute into the second period, Diane Hurley rocketed the puck past Cornell goalie Diane Greaser to knot the score at 2.2.

Cornell took advantage of Crimson mistakes in the remainder of the second, however, scoring three unanswered goals. The ice women failed to clear the puck after Tate, who finished the game with 34 saves made several outstanding stops, enabling the Big Red to take second cracks at many shots.

"We weren't clearing the rebounds. Dooley said, "Cheryl would make the save and then we wouldn't clear it. Everything they got was like that."

Hallada completed a hat trick in the game's final period, and Amy Stanzin took the pack on a breakaway for the last goal, which iced the 7-2 final score.

"We realized we had to come out with a win." Coach Bill Duthie said. "We were already 0-3 and we just couldn't afford to drop this game, especially since it was within the league."

The loss marked the second straight defeat for the Crimson, which dropped a 7-1 match to Northeastern last Thursday.

"We've lost two in a row now," Dooley said. "The important thing now is to make sure we don't get a defeatist attitude."

THE NOTEBOOK: The ice women travel to Brown Wednesday night for another important Ivy showdown...Dooley, who celebrated a birthday Saturday, applauded the play of Tate, as well as Vicki Palmer, Liz Ward and Diane Hurley...The seven goals allowed by Harvard marked the third time this year the ice women have surrendered that many.