Title hopes still alive after win, tie this weekend

Sitting just one point behind Clarkson and Dartmouth, who are tied for third after this weekend’s matches, the Tigers (12-8-5 overall, 10-6-2 ECAC Hockey) have four games left in the season to move up in the standings. Though Princeton went into the weekend with the pressure of its spot in the championships hanging in the balance, the Tigers’ determination to win seemed to overpower any nervousness.

“We want to win every face-off, every period, every game,” senior forward and captain Lizzie Keady said. “The league is tight and will be until the end. Every game is huge for us, and our goal is to finish as high as possible in the standings to earn some seed as well as home ice [in the] playoffs. As a team, we need to focus on the now.”

Riding on the momentum of a four-game win streak, Princeton beat Yale (9-10-6, 6-8-4) 2-1 and tied Brown (3-17-5, 2-12-4) 2-2. Though the Tigers were able to maintain their position in the standings, the tie against Brown left them just shy of third place.

Fueled by their devastating loss to Yale on Jan. 11 in addition to their long-standing Ivy-League rivalry, the Tigers hit the ice with a vengeance in New Haven on Friday night.

Junior forward Annie Greenwood gave Princeton a lead 13 minutes, five seconds into the first period when she fired the puck pipe high and into the net. The Bulldogs, however, were not ready to go down without a fight and battled back with a hard-fought rebound goal.

The game remained tied through the second period. It wasn’t until 7:06 into the third that the Tigers were able to pull ahead. Rushing toward the goal during a power play, Greenwood scored her second goal of the night when she lunged forward to knock a loose puck past the Yale goaltender.

“Annie played really well; she was up and down the rink all game,” Keady said. “Yale is a hardworking, gritty team, and they play well against us every time. In order to beat them we needed to outwork them.”

Though they defeated Brown on Jan. 12, the Tigers could not manage to break the tie last weekend.

Initially the Bears seemed to dominate the ice, scoring twice in the first 3:01 of play. Princeton redeemed itself, however, with a goal by senior forward Micol Martinelli, who caught a rebound shot and lifted it over Brown’s goaltender midway through the first period. After that, the Tigers held control, outshooting the Bears 49-21.

“We got outworked in the first five minutes of the game, so yeah, it was unnerving that we were down,” Keady said. “In situations like that you need to believe you can come back; you need to put your mistakes behind and you and go balls to the wall to dig yourself out of a hole.”

Brown remained in the lead entering the final period, but the Tigers broke through again on a power play 1:45 into the third when Greenwood deflected a shot from junior defenseman Katherine Dineen and found the back of the net. Despite taking more than twice as many shots as Brown, however, the Tigers were unable to find the back of the net again.

“Tying this game is definitely going to push us harder,” freshman defenseman Sasha Sherry said. “We should have had that game. We need to work on executing our plays, keeping possession of the puck and winning every battle.”