On Women's Hockey: Friars Can Now Say They're Getting It Done Early

A somewhat proud and quite paradoxical mantra ought to be churning in the PC women’s hockey locker room on the heels of their opening weekend sweep over Maine.

 

At least there is no more sighing and uttering “At least…” Or, more specifically, there is at least nothing along the lines of “At least we played well,” which was the most pleasant resort they could afford around this time a year ago.

 

If anything, one who is armed with a first aid kit and scoping insistently for a strategic lesion, can say, “At least we held on” after the Friars abolished one penalty after another to finalize yesterday afternoon’s 2-1 victory at Schneider Arena in Part II of the series.

 

“Maine played extremely well, and you knew they would after what happened yesterday,” said Friars’ head coach Bob Deraney. “That didn’t surprise me. What surprised me was that we took some of what I think were uncharacteristic, lazy penalties, and made it real difficult on ourselves. We were just fortunate that a real good Maine team wasn’t able to take advantage of it.

 

On a total of seven partial or full-length opportunities, including three in the third and two five-on-three segments, Maine’s power play brigade nabbed an early 1-0 within the first four minutes of the game, but thereafter whiffed on a cumulative seven shots.

 

“They’re the players of the game for us,” Deraney said in commendation of any given PK quartet (or trinity). “We had everyone kill. We needed to because we took so many penalties, and everyone stepped up, made plays where we needed, our goaltending has been terrific, and I think the penalty kill starts there.”

 

Maybe so, but technically, Providence stopper Genevieve Lacasse did not have to toil as much as she could have. Clinging to their 2-1 lead to commence the third period, the Friars would detonate their discipline beginning at the 7:09 mark and would be shorthanded for the next three minutes and 34 seconds, including their third 5-on-3 deficit of the weekend for 26 ticks.

 

But in that stretch, Lacasse only had one shot reach her immediate area while PC mustered two shorthanded bids. And her praetorian guards would keep her idle over the next two-minute kills between 14:05 and 16:05, while Arianna Rigano thrust another shorthanded shot at Maine’s Brittany Ott.

 

And to both kindle and quickly snuff their own dramatic flame, the Friars took one more citation with 44 seconds to spare, only to have Jean O’Neill draw a subsequent tripping call on Myriam Crousette, forcing the Black Bears to revoke their extra attacker and take last face-off in their end before a brief 4-on-4 sequence.

 

Ott, Lacasse’s former associate on the Detroit Little Caesar’s U19 team, did not exactly have the same luxuries as the Scarborough Save-ior. Though her team only granted Providence four power plays over the course of the day, she had to face 15 shots in those stretches.

 

And she stopped every single one of them. The Friars were thus left utterly empty on the power play for the whole weekend.

 

Then again, unlike in Friday’s 4-0 win, they were at least piling on the attempts (42 total compared to Maine’s 15). And they dented Ott just enough for a favorable difference. And they had a diverse array of contributors, particularly junior defender Amber Yung, who recorded a whopping nine SOG, and senior captain Colleen Martin, who notched six. In all, designated defenders, many of whom took turns imitating Erin Normore by shoving their nose deep into the corners, accounted for 19 PC shots.

 

It was Yung whose late first period bullet from the far circle top capped a stimulating end-to-end transition, drew a 1-1 knot, and splashed a personal scoring drought dating back to February 17, 2008. Counting the McGill exhibition one week prior, Yung now has a point in each of her first three games this season.

 

“That’s an integral part of the way we play,” said Deraney. “We expect more production from all five players when they’re on the ice. It’s not just three forwards and two defensemen. It’s five players going out there for a common goal, and that’s to score.”

 

The Friars had authorized the game’s first five shots, the first four over two Maine power plays, but were seething afterward. For the remaining dozen minutes of the first period, they owned the shooting gallery, 10-2, and over the course of the second, they ran up a 23-4 count in that category.

 

Ott was responsive on a majority of those, including six on PC’s own 5-on-3 advantage to start the middle frame. But one exception fell at the 7:06 mark when another ex-U19 teammate of hers,

Ashley Cottrell, parked herself on the porch, vacuumed a careless Maine clearing attempt, and nimbly lifted it home, spelling the 2-1 difference.

 

And the way the Friars menacingly threatened in several other visits to the Bears’ zone, it could have been a more gaping differential. In any case, they are officially 2-0, given that a handful of programs currently ranked in USA Today’s Top 10 –Boston College, Boston University, and even Wisconsin- have all taken some actual clips to the chin this weekend, there’s a theoretical chance PC could ascend when that poll is revised tomorrow, or at least garner more honorable mention votes.

 

“To be honest with you, it really doesn’t matter right now,” said Deraney. “We’ve got play a lot better than we played (this weekend). The fact that we won two games is the most important thing.

We don’t really care about polls right now. Really, polls matter come second semester, when things really start to take shape. Nothing’s taking shape right now.”

 

But at least now they have been afforded a learning experience that has not cost them valuable points.

 

Al Daniel can be reached at hockeyscribe@hotmail.com

 

This article originally appeared in the Friartown Free Press

Women's Hockey Log: Jess Cohen Bags Two Points, First Star In Debut

A tempestuous sweep check of most every database available could not locate another instance of what Jess Cohen attained for the Friars’ last night. For all of the marquee names branded into the books, no player to have come through PC in this waning decade, and possibly long before that, has ever nabbed a goal-assist value pack in her intercollegiate debut.

 

Ironically, the closest find was none other than current assistant coach Meredith Roth, Cohen’s fellow alumna of the almighty Shattuck-St. Mary’s Prep, who charged up a two-point outing in her second college game versus Findlay on October 29, 2000.

 

So last night, statistically speaking, Cohen set a peerlessly lofty bar for herself in PC’s 4-0 win over Maine. More to the point, though, she made an equally sound visual impression on her coach and associates.

 

She charged up two attempted shots in the first period, one which Maine goaltender Candace Currier turned away, the other going wide. She would launch another three in the second, the first homeward bound from the near face-off dot for the icebreaker and eventual game winner.

 

And in the third, though she would be finished thrusting pucks squarely at Currier’s property for the night, she would issue a magnetic cross-ice pass from the near outer hash marks of the Maine zone that linemate Arianna Rigano slugged home with 13:38 remaining.

 

Her final transcript for the evening: one goal, one helper, three SOG, a plus-2 rating, and the distinction of the game’s No. 1 star. Meanwhile, her linemates Rigano and Alyse Ruff led the team with four shots apiece on the night.

 

“Not surprised. She’s a very good player,” assessed head coach Bob Deraney. “She played in the shadow of players like Brianna Decker and Amanda Kessel (at Shattuck), but when you watch her, she kind of held the whole line together and did some fabulous things.

 

“So, I’m not surprised. I knew it was going to come at some point. Did I think it was going to come this fast? No, I didn’t, so I’m really happy for her. She deserved it tonight.”

 

O’Neill rolling along
Junior Jean O’Neill, a first-line winger and newly anointed A-captain, joined Cohen in the multi-point club last night, collaborating with fellow wing Laura Veharanta to assist on Ashley Cottrell’s second period goal and nailing her own just 3:15 later.

 

Her late conversion to curtain a decisive second period quickly abolished any residual disappointment from late in the first period, when she saw two consecutive tries scurry wide of the cage. It would also equal her first two-point performance since her freshman year, an unhesitating hint that she is back to her old, ideal form after a so-so, injury-riddled sophomore campaign.

 

“She really worked extremely hard over the summer to prepare for this season, and I think it’s the benefit of how hard she worked,” said Deraney. “And if anyone deserved to come out with thus type of effort in her first game of her junior year, it was her.”

 

Quick feeds: Sophomore defender Lauren Covell, who assisted on Cohen’s decider, led the team with a plus-3 rating on the night…Starting Maine defender Jessica Bond led both sides with six shots…The Friars’ recently released prospectus indicates that the Skating Strides charity will make its annual stop at Schneider Arena on January 23, when PC hosts Boston College…2009 program and school graduates Mari Pehkonen and Brittany Simpson both put in an appearance at last night’s game…Dating back to December of 2007, PC has now scored exactly four goals –no more and no less- in each of their last five meetings with Maine, all of them wins…Part II of this series faces off at 4:00 p.m. and will be viewable through online streaming on the Friars’ official website.

 

Al Daniel can be reached at hockeyscribe@hotmail.com

 

This article originally appeared in the Friartown Free Press

Women's Hockey 4, Maine 0: Friars Whitewash Black Bears To Start Season

Apart from a Hockey East championship banner and concomitant passport to the NCAA tournament, one other element has been conspicuously lacking in PC’s Skating Sorority since the 2004-05 season: a 1-0 start to the schedule.

 

For the moment, at least the latter of those jutting jinxes is officially passé thanks to last night’s 4-0 triumph over Maine before an encouraged opening night mass of 170 at Schneider Arena and a confident coach who was quick to assign his tangible gains to the middle row of the minivan.

 

When reminded that his program –regardless of however many moral winning streaks they may have sparked in past Octobers- had not drawn a genuine “W” to start the year in over a full collegiate generation, Bob Deraney offered a sarcastic, albeit polite, “Thanks.”

 

“I don’t even know about that, because every year is a different year,” he continued. “We may have not won our first game the last couple of years, but it’s not about the win, it’s about how you play, and I thought we played really well tonight. We played smart, we really had a couple of times where we needed to have a gut check, and we answered that call. We learned a lot about ourselves tonight and I like what I see. I think the kids do too.”

 

Both contesting squads took time to kick up their full energy flow, amounting to a scoreless first period with a 7-3 shot count favoring the Friars. But in the latter 40 minutes, Providence asserted itself with 11 of 15 skaters garnering at least one shot on net and seven of them ultimately touching the scoresheet.

 

It began at the 4:35 mark of the middle frame, with freshman winger Jess Cohen settling down a feed from defender Lauren Covell in the near face-off circle after a hectic swarm filled with wide near-misses and a few non-calls (in Deraney’s fervent opinion, at least). Once in comfortable control of the disk, Cohen wasted little time snapping it home low to the left of Maine stopper Candace Currier (21 saves).

 

To their credit, the Black Bears confined the Friars to a somewhat shallow 25 shots on the whole night, a sound follow-through on an implicit vow to make their collection of shots-against a prime candidate for a spot on NBC’s Biggest Loser. Not to mention, PC is continuing to press forward while missing a full forward line due to a horrid injury bug.

 

All that aside, the middle frame proved an effective period to collect insurance, which Providence did in amassing 12 registered stabs, three of which would go through via Cohen, Ashley Cottrell at 16:25, and Jean O’Neill on a four-on-four breakaway with only 20.5 seconds till intermission.

 

“We’re hoping that tomorrow, we will put Abby Gauthier and Kate Bacon into the lineup for the first time this year,” Deraney noted. “That’ll be a real nice shot in the arm, but the way we played today, I think that will just add to our depth.

 

“Our kids played their hearts out today. We only had three lines and three sets of D, and if you watched us, you would have thought we had a full complement, so that’s a credit to how hard our kids played out there tonight.”

 

Maine assumed control of the shooting gallery for the third (9-6), and threatened early on a carry-over penalty to Alyse Ruff that overlapped with Laura Veharanta’s checking call at 0:35, amounting to 55 seconds worth of 5-on-3.

 

Nothing doing, though. Providence goaltender Genevieve Lacasse (19 saves, seventh career shutout) only dealt with one shot during that penalty kill, and within four minutes of Veharanta’s release, Cohen set up linemate Arianna Rigano for a tumbling conversion at 6:22, ultimately finalizing the 4-0 difference.

 

And so, the “Glory Days” –both in the statistical sense and in the sense of Bruce Springsteen taking over the PA system after the stick salute- came to Friartown substantially earlier and before. The natural objective is to continuously renew those good days, beginning with a sweep of this weekend’s series this afternoon.

 

“We talked about it in our (locker) room. We’re only halfway to our goal (for this weekend),” Deraney said. “And the other thing is I push our kids right to the end. And you might be saying, ‘Why aren’t you coaching for tomorrow?’ But I’m coaching for the season, and we need to create an energy level and a conditioning level that will last for 120 minutes, not just 60, of the hardest hockey you can possibly play.

 

“We kept the throttle all the way down even when we were up by four goals with five (minutes) to go. It doesn’t matter to me. We’ve got a lot more to give, and we’re going to get it out of them.”

 

Al Daniel can be reached at hockeyscribe@hotmail.com

 

This article originally appeared in the Friartown Free Press