It was a bittersweet weekend for the Yale women’s hockey team, ending with a win and a loss in pair of conference games.

The Bulldogs (8–10–1, 5–7–0 ECAC) endured a tough defeat to Cornell (9–6–3, 7–2–2) on Friday afternoon, losing 2–0 in a shutout to the Big Red. However, the team rebounded with a decisive 5–1 victory against Colgate (5–18–0, 2–9–0) the following day.

“The team played great all weekend,” defenseman Kate Martini ’16 said. “Everyone brought their best effort in both games and unfortunately we just couldn’t manage to find a way to score against Cornell. We played as a team and played with a lot of energy in both games.”

In Friday’s game against Cornell, both the Big Red and the Bulldogs were focused on an active offense. The two teams each peaked in terms of shots on goal during the first period, although not one found the back of the net. Just after eight minutes into the game, Yale goalkeeper Jaimie Leonoff ’15 stepped away from the goal to block a shot. The rebound attempt on the wide-open goal was saved by defenseman Mallory Souliotis ’18, who dove to the ice to block the opportunity.

This was followed by a series of three successive power plays for Yale, which could not capitalize on any of them. Despite 11 penalties throughout the game, with five called on the Bulldogs and six on the Big Red, neither team was able to convert a power play opportunity into a goal.

It appeared that the game would be scoreless entering the third period, but with only 25 seconds remaining Cornell forward Caroline DeBruin overcame a two-on-one to put the Big Red on the board.

Following the pace of the game so far, both teams continued to push offensively, but no goals were scored for most of the third period. In the final minute of the game, Leonoff was pulled from the goal. In spite of a face-off on the Cornell side of ice in the last 15 seconds due to an icing call, Yale could not manage to win the drop of the puck, and the Big Red upped the score to 2–0 with a goal on the empty net.

“This weekend was the best weekend that we have put together so far this season,” captain and defenseman Aurora Kennedy ’15 said. “Unfortunately, our strength of play did not materialize on the scoreboard. We outplayed Cornell, but their goalie had a really good game and we could not put one past her.”

This was the second time that the Elis faced Cornell this season. The last game ended with a 6–2 victory for the Big Red. Although the second contest ended in defeat for the Bulldogs as well, players believed that they proved they could be competitive with their tough conference competition.

Cornell has several players who are members of the Canadian National team, and according to forward Hanna Åström ’16, they are always one of the top teams in the league.

While the game was a loss for the Bulldogs, they did take 10 more shots than the Big Red, with 41 throughout the game.

“It’s impossible not to score [with that many shots,]” Åström said. “But we made it possible. At least we generated a lot of opportunities.”

It was a completely different atmosphere for Yale during Saturday’s came against Colgate. Although the Raiders scored the first goal of the game 12:07 in the first period, it was the only shot that escaped Leonoff that day. The Bulldogs answered five minutes later with a combination of passes that led to forward Jackie Raines ’15 finding the back of the net in order to tie the game.

For the next two periods, Yale dominated the matchup with four goals, including two from forward Phoebe Staenz ’17, who earned three points in the game. Another goal came from defenseman Madi Murray ’15, who got one past Raider goalkeeper Ashlynne Rando for her second career goal.

According to Åström, Yale accomplished many of its offensive goals for the weekend, including having players work their way closer to the net to shoot. The team took a total of 75 shots in the two games this weekend, much higher than the team’s average of 29.3 per game.

On both Friday and Saturday, Yale will take on Brown in an attempt to boost its ECAC standing.

HOPE ALLCHIN