W. Hockey Raises Banner Tonight

Before the No. 1 Harvard women's hockey team begins conference play at Bright Hockey Center tonight at 7 p.m., the Crimson has to take care of some unfinished business from last year.

About 10 minutes before the puck drops, Athletic Director William J. Cleary '56 and last season's co-captains--A.J. Mleczko '99 and Claudia Asano '99--will help Coach Katey Stone unveil the 1998-99 AWCHA national championship banner. The banner will be on display at the east end of the rink, close to where the men's NCAA championship banner from 1988-89 has been sitting, all alone, for a decade.

Tatiana M. Ali '02, a pop recording artist and former castmember of "The Fresh Prince of Bel Aire," is slated to sing the national anthem.

"We're excited about it, but we also know that this is the final celebration from last year," said junior winger Tammy Shewchuk, the defending ECAC Player of the Week. "So we'll have fun for a few minutes, then we have to focus on beating Dartmouth."

No. 7 Dartmouth (2-0-0, 2-0-0 ECAC) comes to Cambridge locked in a three-way tie for first place in the ECAC. The Big Green is led by a pair of sophomore forwards in forward Kristin King (3 goals, 1 assist) and defenseman Correne Bredin (1, 3).

Bredin anchors an aggressive defense that will try to slow down Harvard's high-scoring attack. That strategy almost worked at Bright last February, when the Big Green held the Crimson in regulation before falling in overtime, 3-2. In the ECAC semifinals, however, Harvard exploded in the second period to wipe out Dartmouth, 8-1.

"Dartmouth is a physical, bump-and-grind team," Shewchuk said. "We're more of a fast-skating team so we're just going to chip away at them. Hopefully we can do what we did in the ECACs last year, get on the power play and dismantle them piece by piece."

Harvard's top forward line of Shewchuk (5, 2), sophomore center Jen Botterill (3, 4) and junior winger Angie Francisco (1, 5) combined for 20 points last weekend as the Crimson began the season with wins at Wisconsin and then-No. 5 Minnesota. Most of the action should take place in the Dartmouth zone, where Harvard will test Big Green junior goaltender Meaghan Cahill.

On the other end of the ice, Crimson sophomore netminder Alison Kuusisto will start for the first time this season. Kuusisto, who posted a perfect 11-0 record in 1998-99 including wins in the Beanpot and AWCHA championship games, replaces senior goaltender Crystal Springer, who is out for at least a month with a sprained knee.

"Nothing much has changed since last year for me," Kuusisto said. "I've never played against Dartmouth, so I need to go out there prepared for anything. Everyone on the team is confident in each other's abilities, and I'm really excited to get out there again."