No. 9 Princeton Wins on Senior Day to Secure Home Ice

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Women's Ice Hockey

October 17, 2PM

at UConn

Women's Ice Hockey

October 18, 1PM

at UConn

Women's Ice Hockey

October 24, 6PM

at Brown

Providence, R.I.

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October 25, 3PM

at Yale

New Haven, Conn.

Women's Ice Hockey

October 31, 3PM

vs RPI

Princeton, N.J.

If someone were to write a script about how Senior Day should go it would be hard to match the way the seven seniors in the Princeton lineup went out in style in their final regular-season home game.

Trailing by a goal entering the third period, the Tigers (18-8-3, 14-6-2) scored three times for a 4-2 win over Rensselaer; clinching fourth-place and the final home spot in next weekend's ECAC playoffs. Princeton will host Quinnipiac next weekend in the best-of-three series.

"This was perfect, A really nice day," said senior winger Molly Contini, who assisted on freshman Carly Bullock's game-winning power-play goal. "Everyone's families were here. Their friends were here. It's a special weekend to begin with and to be able to come back and win was huge."

Contini was just one of the heroes that lived up to the "Magnificent Seven" banner that was hung in the Hobey Baker Rink balcony prior to the game to honor the Princeton seniors. Six of the Tigers' seven seniors had at least one. The seventh, winger Morgan Sly, provided the key screen on defender Molly Strabley's game-tying goal early in the third.

For the second straight night Princeton dominated the opening period, outshooting the Engineers (10-22-2, 7-14-1). The Tigers outshot RPI, 17-6, much like they did on Friday against Union.

Princeton took a 1-0 lead on senior Audrey Potts' short-handed goal, her second goal of the season. Classmates Kelsey Koelzer and Fiona McKenna, were credited with the assists after starting the play by taking the puck away at the RPI blueline. Koelzer raced up the left side, sent a shot from the circle that a lunging Potts was able to chip up and over goalie Lovisa Selander.

The Tigers, after dominating the first, were a bit more conservative in the middle period and the Engineers took advantage. Shayna Tomlinson scored on the power play 3:01 into the second to tie the game. Senior defender Hannah Behounek gave the Engineers the lead with 4:51 left in the period to make it 2-1.

"I think we took it to them in the first and then we kind of sat back a little in the second and played more defense. It didn't really work out for us," Koelzer said. "The second intermission came at a good time. We were able to reflect and get the time to focus on what was important right then right there which was being first to every puck, pressuring in the offensive zone, taking as many shots as possible and just going to the net."

The Tigers opened the third period with a power play, peppering Selander with six shots, but were unable to get the game-tying goal. Nonetheless the tone was set for the period. A period in which Princeton would fire 21 shots at the Engineers' net.

"That goalie has our number. She's unbelievable," sid Contini with a smile about Selander after the netminder finished the game with 49 stops. "She made a lot of big saves. You just have to keep pressing and sooner or later something's going to go in. You just have to have that mentality or else you're going to bury yourself. We just had the mindset that we're going to throw everything at her feet, crash, and then try to get some goals. That ended up happening."

Strabley, the only senior defender in the lineup with Koelze playing forward, followed that mindset to a tee, sending a shot from the point after McKenna won an offensive zone face off to the right of Selander with 14:50 left in regulation. The goal was Strabley's third of the season.

Princeton's power play, kept off the board in its first four chances, used all but one second of its next opportunity before Lund scored the eventual game-winner with 4:10 left in the third.

Freshman defender Claire Thompson fed Contini behind the net and the senior found Bullock all alone in the slot. The freshman sent a laser into the net for her 19th goal of the year.

To their credit, the Engineers did not go down quietly. Entering the game needing a tie to clinch the final playoff spot, RPI turned up the pressure in the closing minutes before senior Cassidy Tucker put an exclamation point on things.

With Selander pulled for the extra attacker, Kiersten Falck and Koelzer forced a turnover in the defensive zone. Koelzer found Tucker with a pass and Tucker backhanded a shot from just outside her own blue line into the vacated net.

"It was just kind of a sigh of relief," Koelzer said. "Even when we scored the go ahead goal there was still four minutes left. Which is a lot of time especially for a very talented offensive team like RPI."

While the seven seniors were deservedly the center of attention, Strabley was quick to credit the Princeton players that came before her class, several of whom were in the stands today.

"I don't think it's all due to us necessarily," Strabley said. "I think the people that came before us made a big impact on the program even starting in our freshman year — people like Denna (Laing), Gabie (Figueroa), (Olivia) Mucha, all those guys — they picked up the level of play here and pointed our team in a positive direction. I think we've grown on that since then."

Princeton will host fifth-place Quinnipiac next weekend at Hobey Baker Rink.

Contini and her teammates are excited for the series with their travel partner. "It's interesting. I think my sophomore year we went to Quinnipiac and they beat us 7-0 and 1-0, we didn't even score a goal. We've gone from that to we've swept them, we played two really good games against them. It's going to be a good weekend. I think we match up really well with them. We're excited for it."

In a somewhat surreal moment after the game, the visiting locker room went from quiet to elated after the Engineers received news that Harvard had lost at home to tenth-place Brown, 3-1, giving RPI the final playoff spot. The Engineers will travel to Potsdam next weekend to face first-place Clarkson.

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