Ruggiero, W. Hockey Unload on Physical Wayne State

Wayne State, a fledging women’s hockey program, learned a lot of lessons from playing the No. 1 Crimson Saturday night. Chief among them was that checking junior captain Angela Ruggiero is about as rewarding as banging one’s head against a brick wall.

The Warrior player who checked Ruggiero actually impaired her own balance more than Ruggiero’s, defeating the purpose of the illegal check. She then steamrolled over her opponent.

“She made them pay,” Harvard coach Katey Stone said. “We were watching and thinking, ‘Someone’s going to pay,’ then bang.”

Then Ruggiero raced in, ripping an unassisted, shorthanded goal past Warrior sophomore goaltender Tina Thibideau at 10:40.

That goal was the fourth of a school record-tying five goals for Ruggiero on the night as Wayne State (5-10-0) fell 9-0 to the Crimson (12-1-0, 5-0-0 ECAC) in its first game since winter break.

Ruggiero’s five goals came on just six shots on net.

“That shot there is money,” Stone said. “Every time she rips that puck, I see it go in. Very few people can stop that.”

Saturday night also marked the return of another captain to the lineup. Kalen Ingram played for the first time since dislocating and fracturing her thumb during the Crimson’s victory over Dartmouth on Nov. 9. Ingram celebrated her return in style, scoring a power play goal at 13:08 in the third period.

Stone shook up the line combinations by returning Ingram to the second line, and alternating sophomore Kat Sweet and senior Tracy Catlin on the first line with Harvard captain Jennifer Botterill and freshman Julie Chu.

In the first start of her Harvard career, freshman Ali Boe made six saves in two periods, and junior Emily Smith recorded five saves in the third for the shutout. Thibideau made 56 saves for the Warriors in the loss.

After a sluggish start where Harvard scored just one first-period goal, the Crimson picked up its play in the last two periods. Harvard scored four goals in each period, including three in the first four minutes of the second to put the game away. Ruggiero accounted for half of those goals in each of the last two periods.

“[In] the second and third periods we really started to make it tough on them because we were moving the puck a lot faster,” Stone said. “We held on to the puck way too long in the first period so we didn’t have real good quality chances.”

When Harvard’s scoring heated, so did Wayne State’s tempers. The Warriors clutched, grabbed and held Harvard players down on the ice whenever the referee had her head turned.

Wayne State’s captains Kelly Meech and Katie Jones led the team with four penalty minutes each, though many more could have been called. Meech’s methods of leading the team included slamming Botterill into the corner of the boards, where the end of the bench meets the beginning of the plexiglass.

This style of play didn’t phase the Crimson, especially not Ruggiero.

“I definitely play better when it’s a tough physical match and so today was fun,” she said. “They couldn’t catch us so I think they were trying to knock us over.”

Ruggiero’s first goal, the only score in the first period, came on the power play at 8:32 off a deflection from Botterill, who tallied one goal and five assists on the night. Chu finished the game with a goal and two assists.

Harvard just missed scoring double digits in goals for the third time this season by about a second.

The referee called two penalties on Harvard in the last minute, yet despite the two-man disadvantage, Botterill and Chu still broke out on odd-man rush in the final seconds. Botterill’s shot beat Thibideau just after the clock expired.

For the final insult, sophomore Kelly Zamora checked Botterill from behind as she skated back.

Harvard travels on the road again this weekend, at Yale Friday and at No. 9 Princeton on Saturday. The Crimson will have to play both games without the nation’s leading scorer, Botterill, who will be absent for Canadian national team tryouts.