Kelly Babstock and Nicole Connery scored two goals each as the Quinnipiac Bobcats defeated the Brown Bears 5-0 to continue a three game winning streak.
It was a game in which the Bobcats (15-9-2, 9-5-1 ECAC) outplayed the Bears (4-15-1, 3-12-0 ECAC) from puck drop.
“I thought the energy was great; we have to pay more attention to detail, but that’s to be expected after a couple of weeks off but for the most part, I was happy with the effort,” Quinnipiac coach Rick Seeley said.
Quinnipiac outshot Brown, 38-12, in the game and held Brown to only six shots through the final two periods of the game.
“I think with this group today, it was probably 20 individuals instead of like a team, which didn’t help; we were not great, but Quinnipiac is a good team and that added to our problems today,” Brown coach Amy Bourbeau said.
Connery got the scoring started for Quinnipiac at just 3:39 into the contest when she tucked the puck into the back of the net after it came loose in front of the crease. The Bobcats had a two-on-one breakaway into the offensive zone as Connery sent a pass to Brittany Lyons, who tried to backhand the shot. Brown goaltender Katie Jamieson knocked it down in goal, but the rebound came out loose. Amanda Colin swiped the puck to Connery, who made it 1-0 Quinnipiac.
“I really love playing with them; we work well together, support each other, and it feels like we know where each other are, it makes the game a lot easier,” Connery said of being linemates with Lyons and Colin.
Less than two minutes later, Connery lit the lamp for the second time of the game and ninth time of the season. She came down on another two-on-one with Nicole Kosta to her right. Connery tried passing to Kosta, but the pass was knocked down by a diving Brown defenseman before Lyons corralled the puck and backhanded a pass to Connery, who was wide open in front of the net.
“She was awesome; I thought every part of her game, she was forechecking well, backchecking well, her energy was great,” Seeley said. “She’s been like that the second half, every practice, every day, so it’s exciting to see her play like the player we thought we recruited.”
Babstock made it 3-0 Bobcats after wristing a shot top shelf over Jamieson’s blocker. Regan Boulton passed the puck from the left point to Cydney Roesler at the right point. Roesler then fired the puck across the ice to Babstock, who was left alone on the left side of the goal.
“They out-executed us, so we started to get a little running around, they were breaking the puck out very easy on us, and it started to get us caught in the D-zone where we were getting tired,” Bourbeau said.
Brown made adjustments in the second and third periods, which tightened up the Bobcats and limited them to two more goals in the game.
Early in the second period, Babstock netted her second goal of the game to increase the Bobcats lead to 4-0. Nicole Brown sent a pass to Kosta as she skated across the blue line into the offensive end. Kosta found a streaking Babstock in the slot, who shot the puck from the right side of the goal into the left side of the net.
Felica Vieweg finished off the scoring for the Bobcats with 2:04 remaining in the game after ripping a slap shot from the point to make it 5-0. Kristen Eklund passed to Breann Frykas on the left boards, who found Vieweg wide open at the point.
Victoria Vigilanti finished with a 12-save shutout for the Bobcats, while Jamieson stopped 33 shots in the loss for the Bears.
When asked about looking at tomorrow’s game, Connery seconded Seeley’s words on continuing to pay attention to detail.
“Definitely do what we were doing today, but emphasize it a little more, which is working on the details; we’ve been working on them for two weeks,” Connery said.
