Women's Hockey Picks Up First Win

After a 3-3 tie with Yale last night, the Harvard women’s hockey team bounced back this afternoon with a dominant 4-2 win over Brown. The win came from the efforts of sophomores Josephine Pucci and Jillian Dempsey, and tri-captains Liza Ryabkina and Kate Buesser.

The Crimson had some initial trouble finding the back of the cage in the first period, in which Harvard outshot the Bears, 13-7. Success finally came with 1:29 left in the first period. Pucci halted a breakout attempt by Brown and made a quick switch from defense to offense, winding through her opponents until she found the top corner of the goal.

The second period was a different story, with the Crimson coming out strong and banging in back-to-back goals. With just under 10 minutes to play in the second, Ryabkina took a pass from sophomore Kaitlin Spurling and buried the puck in the back of the net. 58 seconds later, Dempsey made her mark, finishing the rebound of a shot from freshman Gina McDonald.

After Harvard took a commanding 3-0 lead, the Bears pulled together a comeback effort through the pair of goals from Erica Kromm in the second period and Alena Polenska in the final period. But the Crimson closed the deal with Buesser’s goal following back-to-back penalties by Brown.

The Crimson is now 1-0-1 and faces conference rival No. 2 Cornell Nov. 5 in Ithaca, N.Y.