Surprising season ends for w. hockey with pair of home losses to Crimson

Like a group of Old West bandits, the Harvard Crimson found success in their best-of-three playoff series with the Princeton women's hockey team (15-11-3 overall) with a simple formula: shoot the lights out.

The Crimson (18-10-2) relished a combined 84-33 advantage in shots this weekend, beating the Tigers 3-2 and 3-1 at Hobey Ba-ker Rink to advance to the second round of the Eastern College Athletic Confer-ence-North playoffs.

In the series opener, Princeton jumped out early when sophomore forward Gretchen Anderson scored at four minutes, 37 seconds of the first period after a pass from sophomore forward Susan Hobson from behind the net.

Just 2:47 into the second, Anderson struck again as she stuffed home a rebound on a Princeton power play to put her team up, 2-0.

The rest of the weekend was not so enjoyable.

A pair of Crimson freshmen took the game over from there. Forward Ashley Banfield single-handedly tied the game, scoring at 7:47 of the second after driving past two Tiger defenders and at 9:20 of the third when she slapped a one-timer past Princeton sophomore goalie Megan Van Beusekom.

Then, with just three minutes left, forward Nicole Corriero flipped a wrist shot on a two-on-one breakaway past Van Beusekom for her fifth game-winner of the season.

"We started out well," Princeton head coach Jeff Kampersal '92 said. "We played hard and with a lot of passion, but we didn't have enough gas."

"Once we started to get back into our defensive zone, we started to make a few mistakes. That cost us."

Harvard outshot Princeton, 44-21. Van Beusekom had another busy night, making 41 saves while Crimson senior goalie Alison Kuusisto needed just 19.

Facing elimination, Princeton took to the ice the next night facing the same problem.

Harvard came out firing, launching 19 first-period shots to bury Princeton in their zone and head to the locker room with a 1-0 lead after freshman Kat Sweet dove to deflect a puck past Van Beusekom.

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Despite the shooting quagmire, Princeton stayed close and evened the score when Minnesotan senior forward Jessica Fedderly slid a wrist shot from the left circle past Kuusisto at 9:59 of the second.

Van Beusekom was largely responsible for the 1-1 tie after two periods. She held off the 32-10 shot disparity with several great saves, including three consecutive stops on close-range shots that kept rebounding to Harvard shooters.

The third period was again the Tigers' downfall.

Crimson junior forward Kalen Ingram scored twice in the final twenty minutes, beating Van Beusekom at 8:57 with a shot that the goalie initially stopped but could not control and again at 15:31, taking a faceoff from the right circle and threading the puck home.

"We settled down and got back in the flow in the second period," Kampersal said, "but we just couldn't stay with them."

Harvard outshot the Tigers 40-12 in the clincher, including 19-6 in the first period and 13-4 in the second.

Van Beusekom made 37 saves in the loss while Kuusisto turned away 11. Both teams had trouble capitalizing on the power play. The Crimson went 0-4 and the Tigers were 0-2.

The loss ended the Princeton women's hockey season and the collegiate careers of seniors Melissa Deland, Aviva Grumet-Morris, Fedderly, and Wanda Mason.

"These four seniors as a group are the best class I've ever had in terms of focus," Kampersal said.

"They will leave a legacy."