Women's Hockey Scores Five Goals in Win

The Harvard women’s hockey team needed to score a season high five goals to get past Colgate in a come-from-behind-win, 5-4, Friday night as the Crimson (13-2-2, 8-2-1 ECAC) was able to battle back from a lost lead and beat the Raiders (5-15-2, 2-8-0) at Starr Rink in Hamilton, NY.

In a game that saw three lead changes, Harvard was able to persevere and overcome a 2-4 deficit early in the third period after it took a 2-1 lead at the beginning of the game.

“Overall I think we would have wanted to come out with a faster start, but we got better as the game went on and answered back when we needed to and protected the lead at the end, which was key for us,” junior forward Hillary Crowe said.

Colgate broke through during the first minute of the game on a goal by junior forward Taylor Craig. The junior was assisted by classmate Katie Case, who passed Craig the puck in front of the Crimson’s goal.

The Raiders had more shots on goal than Harvard with 29 to the Crimson’s 25. Harvard goalie Emerance Maschmeyer had 25 saves on the night for the Crimson, while Colgate’s Ashlynne Rando had 20 saves.

“Obviously we had to battle back from a lot of adversity going down a couple times and I think we showed a lot of character and drive by being able to come back from a two goal deficit,” sophomore forward Miye D’Oench said.

Harvard was able to answer Colgate’s early goal with back-to-back scores in the second period from Crowe and sophomore forward Mary Parker. Parker’s goal came on an assist from sister Elizabeth a minute into the second period. Mary took Elizabeth’s pass and made a shot to the left and found an empty pocket in the back of the Raiders’ goal to tie the game at one.

“It definitely felt really good to get that first goal for the team, especially after the team went down 1-0,” Parker said. “There was a lot of good passing involved and we all put effort into that first goal.”

The Crimson’s go-ahead goal in the second period came less than a minute after Parker’s, when Crowe drove down the ice, unassisted, and drove the shot into the Colgate goal.

“Going into the second period coming off being down in the first period we just came out in the beginning [of the second period] and pop a few quick goals in to boost our confidence,” Parker said.

Harvard’s lead came to an end as the second period dwindled. The Raiders went ahead 3-2 on a goal at 10:35 from Colgate senior forward Jocelyn Simpson, who was assisted by senior forward Rachel Walsh.

However, going into the final period of play, Harvard was determined to finish the game right.

“We knew that if we stuck to our game, worked hard, and put pucks on the net that good things were going to happen and we didn’t need to freak out,” Crowe said. “We focused on playing fast, but not hurrying because we had faith in ourselves if we focused on playing our game for a solid 20 minutes.”

The Raiders tacked on another goal at the beginning of the third period to put the Crimson in a two-goal hole, 4-2, with 17 minutes left in the game. The final 10 minutes of the contest proved to be the most valuable for Harvard, with three goals, including the game winner, coming in the final stages of the game.

“We hadn’t been testing the goalie as much as we could have been in the beginning of the game,” D’Oench said. “That’s how we’ve been successful earlier in the season so we just wanted to do more of it.”

With six minutes and eight seconds left in the game, Crowe was fed a pass from teammate Briana Mastel, took a wide angle shot that saw the puck find the back of the net above the goalie’s glove.

“It was an awesome feeling,” Crowe said. “Everyone was ecstatic in the huddle and it gave us the momentum we needed to maintain the lead and play solid defense for the remainder of the game.”

From that point on, Harvard was able to play tough defense and hold its lead.

“From that point on it was just about working hard and playing smart and working hard to make sure we win battles,” Miye D’Oench said. “It was just about trusting each other and making sure everyone was doing their job and not trying to cover for anyone else.”

—Staff writer Ariel Smolik-Valles can be reached at asmolikvalles@college.harvard.edu.