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Comeback keeps winning streak alive

November 10, 2011
By Usman Zahid

On Friday, the Mustangs women’s ice hockey team came from behind to beat the York Lions 2-1 at Thompson Arena.

The purple and white improved to a 4-5 record for this season and they are currently on a three game win streak after beating York. The Mustangs are now tied with York in the standings with eight points.

The first period was dominated by back and forth play, in which neither team was able to grab a key edge. Both teams played a fairly even first period, however York got a late power play which Western was able to successfully fight off.

“Our special teams are excellent,” Chris Higgins, Mustangs head coach, commented. “Our penalty kill is 95 per cent. No one scores on us in the penalty.”

The second period was in stark contrast to the first, filled with action and a lot of penalties. York came out flying in the second drawing an early penalty from the Mustangs. However, York continued to struggle to score in the power play and lost some of their early momentum.

Midway through the period York took several consecutive penalties, resulting in five-on-three play for Western for an extended time.

“We had penalties from 15:03 left to about the 11 minute mark and most of that was five-on-three,” Dan Church, the Lions head coach, said. “We had to make adjustments today, as we were not able to play the physical game we wanted.”

The Lions were happy they stuck to their game plan. However, they must take advantage of their opportunities and convert on their power plays in order to keep being successful.

“I thought we had a great effort, we stuck to our game plan for the first two periods, however our power play wasn’t very good and a few poor decisions by the defence in the third cost us,” Church said.

York was able to come back after killing off their consecutive penalties and at 12:09 in the second York scored the go-ahead goal.

Western was able to reply before the period was over with Kendra Deller scoring the equalizer at 17:36, tying the game at 1-1 after two periods of play.

Western started the third period on the power play as York took a penalty before the puck dropped, however they were unable to take the lead with the early advantage. It was mostly back and forth play during the third with neither team able to jump ahead.

Both teams had their chances, but it was the Mustangs who came out on top with a clutch goal by Carly Rolph at 17:28 leaving very little time for the Lions to reply, after which Kelly Campbell, the Mustangs goaltender, shut the door to keep Western’s lead in tact. Western was able to win the game 2-1 even though they were out-shot by York 31-19.

“We are learning how to win. Clearly that was a game where they had more chances, we took penalties however, and we had a key goal,” Higgins said. “We never practiced our two man advantage, however we had a chance in the end and the girls buried it.”

“Our goaltending was off the charts,” Higgins said about Campbell’s clutch performance in the game.

“Tonight was great, we killed off penalties very well,” Campbell added. “Our team played awesome and hopefully we can keep it up for Sunday.”

Unfortunately, on Sunday, the Mustangs were not able to keep their winning streak alive when they lost 6-3 to the Windsor Lancers on the road.

On Saturday the Mustangs women’s hockey team will have a chance at redemption against the Windsor squad when they once again travel west to take on the team on the road.

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