Coming off a grueling weekend double-header split against two-time defending NCAA Champion Amherst, the women's hockey team will travel to Connecticut this weekend to take on both Wesleyan and Trinity.
Last weekend started off on a sour note for the Polar Bears, as they fell 3-2 to Amherst on Friday night. Although Emily Tang '14 and Kayte Holtz '13 each scored a goal, multiple penalties and a relative lack of scoring opportunities proved too much for the team to handle when the Lord Jeffs' Geneva Lloyd found the back of the net for the game-winning goal with eight minutes to go in the final period.
The Polar Bears committed seven penalties to the Jeffs' two, and Amherst substantially outshot Bowdoin 41-15.
However, the team was able to bounce back on Saturday with a 2-1 win that snapped a 10-game losing streak against Amherst. The game was deadlocked for the first 30 minutes until Stephanie Ludy '13 scored with 10 minutes to go in the second period. Holtz added a goal of her own five minutes later to lift the team to a 2-0 lead heading into the final period.
Although Amherst was able to salvage one goal with five minutes left in the game, sophomore Tara Connolly's 10 third-period saves powered the Polar Bears through to the final whistle. Connolly, who finished with a combined 68 saves in 72 attempts over the weekend, was named NESCAC Women's Hockey Player of the Week.
"The team knew going into the weekend that Amherst would be a battle," said Connolly. "We certainly weren't satisfied with Friday's results because we knew we were capable of generating more opportunities offensively and staying out of the penalty box. We went to the rink Saturday with the attitude that, 5 on 5, we could absolutely beat one of the best teams in the country, and we never doubted that."
"[It] gives us a lot of momentum heading into the last four games of our season, all of which are really important for NESCAC tournament seedings," she added.
With a 7-4-1 conference record, the Polar Bears find themselves in third place in the NESCAC standings. Trinity currently holds a 5-3-3 conference record, while Wesleyan is winless at 0-11-0. Although wins this weekend wouldn't necessarily bump the Polar Bears past top-ranked Middlebury or Amherst, they would help to preserve the slight advantage the Polar Bears currently hold over the Bantams.
Wesleyan enters the weekend struggling offensively, having scored a total of four goals over the past eight games. According to Connolly, though, "no NESCAC game is ever easy."
The game at Trinity on Saturday, on the other hand, figures to be intense from start-to-finish, as the two teams skated to a 2-2 draw at Watson Arena on January 22. This trip will mark the team's final regular-season road games.