SEASON RECAP: Title Season Ends in Heartache

Coming off of one of the most successful seasons in program history can be both a blessing and a curse.

For the Harvard women’s hockey team, which returned 21 players from a squad that made it all the way to the Frozen Four in 2008, the pressure of those high expectations proved to be just a little too much.

The Crimson’s up-and-down season, which saw the team rebound from a sub-.500 start to take the ECAC regular-season title, came to a heartbreaking end in the ECAC tournament.

Top-seeded Harvard’s semifinal draw was sixth-seeded RPI, a team that had never beaten the Crimson and was playing in its first-ever championship weekend. And though Harvard outshot the Engineers 50-17 for the game, missed Crimson chances and gritty play from RPI’s goaltender pushed the contest to overtime.

Thirteen minutes into the extra session, with the Engineers’ power play about to expire, the puck was launched from the point and found its way past junior goaltender Christina Kessler’s glove.

Game—and season—over.

“Honestly, it’s kind of devastating to have that game decide the remainder of the season,” Kessler said. “It was a tough loss—we totally dominated, and we had a number of chances, and it didn’t seem like anything was going our way.”

But simply to get to that point was an accomplishment in itself for Harvard.

Though the Crimson lost only one contributor from 2008’s fairy-tale team—Olympian Caitlin Cahow ’07-’08—things didn’t immediately click for Harvard.

Tri-captain Sarah Vaillancourt and Kessler took time off to play for their Canadian national teams, while tri-captain Jenny Brine and junior Cori Bassett each missed several games due to injury.

“I think we just didn’t really get the team together,” Brine said. “We knew what we had to do. It was relatively the same team as last year, so we knew we had the capabilities…We all hunkered down and believed in each other and did our best.”

The Crimson was swept twice on the road in November, first by ECAC rivals Clarkson and St. Lawrence, and then by Minnesota.

A 3-2 loss to Connecticut knocked Harvard out of the rankings for the first time in six years, and things looked bleak heading into a Dec. 17 matchup with then-No. 3 Dartmouth.

But spurred by sophomore Liza Ryabkina’s third-period goal, the Crimson beat the Big Green, 3-2, to head into winter break on a high note.

That was the beginning of an impressive turnaround that put Harvard back on top of the ECAC.

Starting with a Jan. 9 win over Brown, the Crimson went undefeated in its last 10 ECAC regular-season contests. Along with Harvard’s comeback came the resurgence of Vaillancourt, who was a top-three finalist for the Patty Kazmaier award, honoring the best player in collegiate women’s hockey.

“I think starting the season, we felt like we were the hunted,” Kessler said. “Every team, they knew they were playing Harvard, and they put on their game faces and came out to play. The biggest difference [at the end] is that we were the hunters. We weren’t ranked near the end, and we had nothing to lose. We came out every game trying to prove something.”

And a little bit of luck gave Harvard the chance to take the ECAC title in the final weekend of play.

League-leading St. Lawrence came to town on Feb. 20, and the Crimson took advantage of its golden opportunity. Harvard crushed the Saints, 4-0, to take the conference lead, and sealed the title with a 6-1 thrashing of Clarkson on Senior Day.

“It was unbelievable,” Brine said. “It was so exciting to play in. You knew your teammates wanted to win the trophy, but also wanted to win the trophy for our class.”

The loss of the senior class will hit Harvard hard next year, as its top three scorers—Vaillancourt, Brine, and Sarah Wilson—are graduating. But left with the bitter taste of disappointment, there’s no doubt that come October, the Crimson will come out hunting.

—Staff writer Kate Leist can be reached at kleist@fas.harvard.edu.