W. Hockey Ousts St. Lawrence From ECACs

The No. 2 Harvard women's hockey team is one step closer to defending its national title.

Led by the offensive heroics of sophomores Angela Ruggiero and Jen Botterill, the No. 2 seed Crimson (21-4-3, 17-4-3 ECAC) rolled to a solid 7-3 victory over No. 7 seed St. Lawrence (18-15-1, 11-12-1) in the first round of the ECAC tournament on Saturday at Bright Hockey Center.

Harvard will face No. 3 seed Dartmouth (19-10-0, 17-7-0) in the semifinal round next Saturday at Brown's Meehan Auditorium after Dartmouth squeaked by No. 6 seed Providence (20-10-3, 14-7-3) 1-0 in double overtime.

Harvard took control of the contest early. The Crimson outshot the Saints in the first period, 16-5.

"At the start of the game, the kids were ready to go," said Harvard Coach Katey Stone. "They were full of energy, well-prepared, fresh."

The Crimson jumped out to a 4-0 advantage in the first period, and never looked back. Ruggiero, a defenseman, started the Crimson scoring less than five minutes into the first period. At the 4:11 mark, Ruggiero made a deft one-on-one move to beat Saints goalie Emily Stein, assisted by junior winger Tammy Shewchuk. Botterill, a center, quickly extended Harvard's lead to 2-0 on a breakaway at 7:57 of the first.

Ruggiero netted her second goal of the afternoon on the power play at 16:32 of the first period. Off a pass from freshman winger Kalen Ingram, Ruggiero shot and scored from the left wing near the blueline, making it 3-0. Then, with less than a minute left before the first intermission, Harvard capitalized on a four-on-three power play. Botterill let one fly from the center of the blueline for 4-0 at the break. She was helped by junior center Angie Francisco, who recorded her 30th assist on the season.

Harvard's defense was able to preserve the early lead. Senior netminder Crystal Springer made 26 saves on the afternoon, 21 of them in the final two periods.

"A fast start allows me to relax and play," Springer said. "I don't have to worry about making any mistakes."

Early in the second, Botterill completed her hat trick and pushed the Crimson's lead to 5-0 with a straight-on shot 15 feet from the net, assisted by Ingram.

"We were moving the puck well and playing as a team," Botterill said. "The quicker we move the puck, the more we get everyone into the game."

The rest of the second period was marked by penalties and sloppier play, with a few near misses for Harvard.

St. Lawrence finally got on the board at 3:45 of the second when Stacy Boudrias put the puck past Springer, with the help of Nicole Kirnan and Kelly Sage. But that was all St. Lawrence could manage in the second, unable to capitalize on three Harvard penalties.

In the third, St. Lawrence's Caroline Trudeau slipped the puck past an outstretched Springer to make it 5-2.

But Harvard responded late in the third with two goals of its own. At the 16:07 mark, Shewchuk finished off a shot by Ruggiero to increase the margin to four goals. And Ruggiero wasted less than a minute to score her third goal of the game, sneaking the puck through Stein's legs from the side of the net.

St. Lawrence's Chera Marshall, assisted by Amanda Sargeant and Shannon Smith, rounded out the scoring with a goal at the 18:15 mark of the third, for the final score 7-3.

The contest was a good warm-up for the Crimson, who outshot the Saints 38-29 and dominated much of the game.

"We put people on their heels today," said Stone, adding that the team will prepare for Dartmouth the same way they readied for St. Lawrence. "We concentrate more on our game, on our strengths, than what others do to us."

"We've had our ups and downs, but that happened early on," Ruggiero added. "But we have momentum now and we are building confidence game by game. Our team knows what it feels like to win it all, and we want to have that feeling again."

In other action, No. 1 seed Brown defeated No. 8 seed Niagara 5-0 and No. 5 seed Northeastern upset No. 4 seed New Hampshire 4-3. The winner of the Dartmouth-Harvard semifinal will face either Brown or Northeastern in Sunday's conference title game.