Photo courtesy Quinnipiac Athletics
By: Matt McAuliffe
Mid-Season Grade: B-
The women’s ice hockey team is now one game over the half way point this season and that means it’s time to assess its success. The Bobcats find themselves with a 11-4-3 overall record and 5-2-1 conference record, landing in third place in the Eastern Collegiate Athletic Conference standings. With an offense that has been streaking, a defense that has been shaky, power play that has been fundamentally sound and a minor slip in the goalie category, a B- grade seems most appropriate.
Offense:
Quinnipiac’s offense has always been a strength of the program, and this year is no different. Quinnipiac is third in the ECAC in goals per game (2.88), fourth in the conference in goals overall (23) and fifth in the conference in shots overall (234). Being top five in three offensive categories is no easy achievement, but it has become a standard for this team since Cass Turner took over as head coach.
“I’m really excited about where we are today, I’d say our last 6 games we’ve just been building and building, when you look at our best hockey it’s as good as its been,” Turner said.
Defense:
One flaw for the No. 8 team in the nation is defense. For a team with three upper classmen in the top two D-lines, there seemed to be lack of experience when it came to the big-time conference matchups. In the game against rival Clarkson, Quinnipiac allowed four goals, three in the third period alone. The last conference game, however, the defense showed resilience against the No. 5 team in the nation at the time in Colgate, allowing just one goal. The senior captain believes it’s a work in progress and has confidence that her team will pick it up on the defensive end of the puck.
“We’ve had a lot of ups and downs so far this year,” Emma Woods said. “But we’ve taken a lot of pauses, and I feel each weekend we keep growing, and that means a lot for our leadership group.”
Special Teams:
Both the power play and penalty kill have been positive attributes to this team for the first half of the season. Quinnipiac is second in the conference in power play percentage (29.6) and second in in power play goals with eight. This is an impressive feat for the Bobcats who went through a multiple-game power play slump early on in the season. Assistant coach Eddie Ardito is the man behind the power play and seems to have found the productive units.
“We did make a couple changes to our power play this past weekend, and we’re hoping we click with that more and build off of it,” sophomore forward Melissa Samoskevich said.
“We are defiantly getting the chances we want on the power play, we’re not finishing like we liked to, but I think the confidence is there,” Woods added.
Goaltending:
Heading into the beginning of the season, there were no doubts that Sydney Rossman, last year’s ECAC goaltender of the year, would be holding down the fort between the pipes. That was the mindset until she was pulled in the conference game against Cornell in the second period, after letting in three goals. The next day, freshman Abbie Ives got the starting nod for the Bobcats against Colgate, where they won 3-1. Since that minor slip, Rossman has started in goal ever since. In the Nutmeg Classic, she let up three goals in the shootout loss against Merrimack (which goes down as a tie in Quinnipiac’s overall record) and let up only two goals in its win over UConn. As for the goalie position in the upcoming games, it seems as though Rossman will continue to start, but that bump in the road was definitely an aspect to the season nobody was expecting.
Biggest Surprise:
The biggest surprise for the first 18 games has been the offensive production of sophomore forward Kenzie Lancaster. Over the summer, Turner was surprised at her improvement from her freshman year. In the 2015-2016 season, she had zero goals and was not getting as much ice time as she had hoped. But Lancaster said she put in work over the summer in her hometown of Waxhaw, North Carolina shooting pucks with her brother in the basement, and those extra reps definitely paid off. So far this season, she has scored six goals and racked up four assists to give her 10 points for the first half of the season. Lancaster is a part of what Cass Turner calls “the energy line,” and has been a pleasant surprise so far for this Quinnipiac team.
Biggest Disappointment:
Quinnipiac’s biggest disappointment has been the offensive production from captain Emma Woods. Her vocal leadership on and off the ice and her ability to motivate her teammates has definitely stood out, but when it comes to the score sheet, she has not been present very often. Last season she had a career high in assists (23) and points (34). So far, Woods only has eight assists and 11 points total. At this point last year Woods had five goals and 13 assists, for 18 points total. In order for this Quinnipiac team to have success in post-season play and tight conference battles, Woods is going to have to find herself on the score sheet a lot more in the second half of the season.
The Bobcats are currently sitting at third in the ECAC, behind Clarkson and St. Lawrence. This weekend Quinnipiac faces Union at 6 p.m. on Friday in Schenectady, New York and play Rensselaer on Saturday at 3 p.m. in Troy, New York.
