Women's Ice Hockey | 3/11/2018 12:42:00 AM

Box Score POTSDAM, N.Y. – The Mercyhurst women's ice hockey team saw its 2017-18 season come to a heart-breaking end with a 2-1 overtime loss in the National Collegiate Women's Ice Hockey Championship Tournament quarterfinals to top-ranked Clarkson at Clarkson's Cheel Arena Saturday afternoon.

Brooke Hartwick netted the lone marker for the Lakers (18-15-4) in the second period. Molly Blasen and Emma Nuutinen had assists.

Clarkson's Michaela Pejzlova and Elizabeth Guigure had Clarkson's tallies with Guigure's being the OT-winner. The Golden Knights (34-4-1) move on to the Frozen Four next weekend in Minneapolis, joining Ohio State, Wisconsin, and Colgate.

Shots on goal were practically even for the game and read 32-28 in favor of Clarkson in the final box score.

"We gave ourselves a chance to win," Head Coach Michael Sisti said. "It's a tough way to go down. We played hard and knew we had them on the ropes, but we couldn't quite knock them out. It was real good college hockey game and I'm obviously proud of my team."

Mercyhurst went 0-for-3 with five shots on its power-play chances, while Clarkson went 1-for-5 with four shots.

Three of Clarkson's power plays came in the first period, including one awarded just 23 seconds into the game. The Lakers successfully thwarted all of them off and trailed just 9-6 in shots on goal at the end of the frame.

"We showed great resiliency right off the bat, taking that penalty a minute in," Sisti said. "We kept coming back."

With time winding down in the second period, the Lakers finally put the first goal of the game on the board. Hartwick redirected a shot from the point by Blasen just after Nuutinen created a Clarkson turnover in the offensive zone. Hartwick's 14^th of the season came at 19:40.

Clarkson knotted things up at one with 14:30 remaining in the third period on the power play. The Golden Knights won the face off and Michaela Pejzlova blasted her 26^th of the season into the cage.

With just 2:38 remaining the Lakers took another penalty to put Clarkson on the player advantage, but Mercyhurst limited the Golden Knights to just one shot on goal and forced overtime.

In overtime, both teams continued to battle in an evenly played game. Blair made nine stops of her 30 saves in the overtime period while the Lakers produced some solid scoring chances of their own in the frame.

Ultimately, it would be Clarkson with the game-winning score at 16:52 in the extra period, with Guigure netting her 26^th of the season on a two-on-one open net after contact with Blair moved her out of the play.
 
OTHER NOTES AND INFO
-The loss was the first Mercyhurst had this season when leading after two periods of play (15-1-1).
-Mercyhurst went 11-4-2 in the second half of the season after finishing the 2017 portion of its schedule 7-11-2.

HE SAID IT
Sisti on his team: "They're obviously a special group. We set our standards high and we challenge our players to win championships every season. What was odd was in early November, people thought we had no chance of getting to the [NCAA] tournament and winning our league championship. We bounced back from that and I felt we had right character people in the locker room. Tonight they played Mercyhurst hockey and I am proud of them."