Women's Hockey Heads for the Canadian Border

The No. 5 Harvard women's hockey team, fresh off a key win at defending-ECAC champion No. 2 Brown, will embark on a much longer road trip this weekend with games at Cornell and No. 4 St. Lawrence.

The Big Red (3-5, 3-5 ECAC)--who recently lost 9-3 to Dartmouth and 8-1 to New Hampshire--has shown little thus far this season to indicate that it has any chance of competing with the Crimson (6-3, 6-1) tomorrow.

The matchup against St. Lawrence (6-2-2, 5-0-1)--which will be played Sunday at 2 p.m. and broadcast live on 95.3 WHRB--should be just as important to the ECAC Standings as Wednesday's battle at Brown.

St. Lawrence might not have the rich tradition of the common ECAC powers, but the Saints will be looking to create some history of their own on Sunday.

The St. Lawrence program has taken great strides recently. Last year, the Saints earned their first ECAC playoff appearance and first winning season ever, including a 4-2 win over Harvard during junior co-captain Jennifer Botterill and senior winger Tammy Shewchuk's annual Canadian national team excursion.

This year, with the help of a top Canadian freshman goalkeeper by the name of Rachel Barrie, St. Lawrence is now looking to take its program to the next level. Since failing to show up for its season-opening series--a pair of 7-0 and 4-3 losses to Minnesota-Duluth--the Saints have put together an eight-game winning streak. They are the only unbeaten team in ECAC play outside of No. 1 Dartmouth.

The Saints have already accomplished what Harvard failed to do this season--go into Dartmouth, and come away with a point. St. Lawrence tied the Big Green last weekend, 2-2, while the Crimson lost 5-4 at Dartmouth on the day of The Game.

Harvard, naturally, is not the least bit intimidated by the Saints' accomplishments.

"We really don't focus on what other teams do," Shewchuk said. "We just like to play Harvard hockey in any rink we go into. It doesn't matter who the opponent is."

If the Crimson can duplicate its disciplined defensive performance against Brown--in which Harvard did not earn a single penalty minute in sixty minutes of play--a win against St. Lawrence will be easier to come by.

"Our philosophy is that if we do the job in the defensive and neutral zone, the offense will eventually come," Shewchuk said. "We know our team has a lot of speed and a lot of offensive talent, so the defense is what we focus on. The offense just takes care of itself."

Last season, the Crimson kept the Saints from feeling too good about their best season ever by dealing them a humbling 7-3 ECAC Quarterfinal defeat that was even more of a blowout than the final score would indicate.

As in the playoff game last year, St. Lawrence should be riding high and confident, especially coming off the tie at Dartmouth. Harvard will look to bring the Saints back down to earth once again.

"They're going to come out to play, and they're going to come out flying," Shewchuk said. "It's just up to us to match and surpass them."

The Crimson will be hard-pressed to match the seven-goal total from the ECAC playoffs last year, however. The Saints appear to be much improved from last year's team, and history would indicate that a dramatic turnaround is not impossible. Case in point--Dartmouth was crushed by Harvard 8-1 in the 1999 ECAC Semifinals then came back to beat the Crimson three times last season.

Barrie is the most obvious player capable of making a difference. The freshman made 46 saves against Dartmouth to allow the Saints to stay alive despite being outshot nearly two-to-one. Barrie earned ECAC goaltender of the week honors two weeks ago while leading St. Lawrence to comfortable wins over traditional ECAC frontrunners Providence, New Hampshire, and Northeastern.

Harvard will continue to rotate junior Allison Kuusisto and freshman Jessica Ruddock in net throughout the weekend. If Ruddock and Barrie get the starts on Sunday, Harvard would be involved in a duel of freshman goaltenders for the second weekend in a row.

While St. Lawrence might not have any scoring punch at the level of Harvard's Botterill and Shewchuk, the Saints do have their share of national-level talent. Defenseman Isabelle Chartrand and freshman forward Gina Kingsbury where both among the 34-players invited to the Canadian National Team's Evaluation camp. Chartrand was also a teammate of Botterill and Shewchuk's in the 1999 Three Nations Cup.

After Sunday's game, Harvard will be out of action for a whole two weeks before flying out for a pair of games at Minnesota-Duluth. The Crimson will not be playing at home again until January 6th, when St. Lawrence returns to Harvard for a rematch.