After three weeks of battling opponents on the road, the women's hockey team returned to Thompson Arena for two wins this past weekend.
The Big Green were unrelenting against Ivy League enemy Princeton on Saturday, capturing a 5-1 victory over a team they lost to 4-3 earlier in the season. On Sunday, Dartmouth out-shot Yale 55-4 but only came away with a 2-0 win.
The wins improved Dartmouth's record to 14-11-1 overall.
"We were a little down about the past week but everyone came ready to play," co-Captain Amy Coelho '97 said.
Usually a two-minute penalty against a team disrupts momentum and puts the offending team on the defensive.
Not the case for the Big Green on Saturday.
In fact, junior Michelyne Pinard's two-minute penalty for hooking at 6:16 into the first period seemed to be exactly what her team needed.
It should have been Princeton sharpshooter Karen Chernisky putting away her specialty power play goals. Instead, it was a short-handed goal from Emilie Schnitman '98 off a feed from Sarah Hood '98.
Just over one minute into the penalty, Hood flipped the puck to Schnitman who took it straight in to the top left corner, one-on-one with Princeton goalie Tammy Orlow.
One minute later, back on the ice for less than 20 seconds, Pinard knocked in Dartmouth's second netter unassisted.
That was far from the end for the Big Green. Three and a half minutes later, Dartmouth was back to harass Orlow again.
This time it was co-Captain Malaika Little '97 and Jen Lane '98 who set up the play for Erin Rath '98. Little passed the puck along Princeton's blue line to Lane who crossed to a waiting Rath. Rath picked up the pass and redirected the puck past Orlow.
Although they were unable to score again in the first, the Big Green refused to let up on their pressure, spending the majority of their time by the Princeton net and tallying 17 shots to Princeton's three over the course of the period.
"We kept their shots down," Coach George Crowe said. "We never let them get going."
Back in the second, Dartmouth was goal-hungry again. Junior Jessica Clark crossed the puck from the right side of the net to Jamie Arndt '00 stationed at the left post. Arndt popped the puck into the goal for a fourth goal less than a minute into the period.
"Those three quick goals, that was huge," Coelho said. "And then to come out and score another quick goal in the second, that put them behind the eight ball."
Not surprisingly, it was high-scorer Mandy Pfeiffer who notched the Tigers' only goal for the afternoon at 8:24 in the second.
She was answered by Dartmouth high-scorer Hood who blasted a slapshot from the blue line to the top shelf with 1:45 left in the second.
Princeton picked up its play in the third but was unable to get the puck past Dartmouth goalie Melissa Siegfried '96. The score stayed at 5-1 throughout the remainder of the game to give the Big Green a huge victory.
"[Siegfried] had a good game," Crowe said. Despite having few shots to keep her warmed up, Siegfried was able to contain the shots Princeton did take. "Sometimes those are the hardest games to play."
The team has now won four of its last five competitions against Princeton.
"It was a very good team effort," Crowe said. "We played three strong periods ... The goals were well-distributed over the lines."
Back on the ice on Sunday, Dartmouth came up with the win, but a frustrated win it was.
The team found out that it doesn't matter how many shots you take when the opposing goalie is on fire. And Yale goalie Laurie Belliveau was most certainly on fire.
Holding the game together for her team, junior Belliveau tallied 53 saves on the afternoon, allowing only two to slip past her. Her teammates, on the opposite end of the spectrum, took a total of four shots on Siegfried.
"It was the best game [Belliveau's] ever played against us," Dartmouth Assistant Coach Judy Parish said. "We usually break her down a lot earlier on in the game."
To add to the spectacular play of Belliveau, Dartmouth was missing some of the spark that it possessed the day before. The team managed to get off a good number of shots each period but the crisp, clean passes of the previous day had disappeared.
"They play to keep the score down," Crowe said. "There's no flow to the game when we play them."
It wasn't until 16 minutes into the second period that Dartmouth finally connected with the goal. Hood had her second netter of the weekend with a slapshot to the bottom right corner. Schnitman and Wendy Soutsos '99 earned assists on the goal.
The team's second goal came at 12:06 in the third. Clark carried the puck down the left side and crossed it to a cutting Christin Szarek '00. Szarek used her momentum to propel the puck into the goal.
The remainder of the game was stop-and-go with the referees calling five penalties within two minutes. The game ended with a 2-0 shutout for Dartmouth.
"We needed a win and that's what we got," Rath said.
The team is back on the road this weekend, traveling to Boston to play Harvard and Northeastern.
