PLATTSBURGH, NY – The Cortland women's hockey team dropped a State University of New York Athletic Conference (SUNYAC) contest at Plattsburgh, ranked 13th nationally by USCHO.com and 14th nationally by DIIIHockeyNews.com, by a 5-1 score on Friday evening. Cortland drops to 14-6-4 (8-3-2 SUNYAC), while Plattsburgh improves to 17-6-1 (11-1-1 SUNYAC).
With the win, Plattsburgh clinches the SUNYAC regular-season title, as well as the top seed in the upcoming conference tournament. Cortland can still secure the second seed in the conference tournament with a win, tie, or overtime loss against Potsdam in its final conference contest, or an Oswego tie or loss against William Smith tomorrow. The Red Dragons have 18 points in conference play, while William Smith and Oswego both sit on 16 points. Cortland would win a tiebreaker at 18 points against William Smith by virtue of two head-to-head wins, but Oswego would hold the edge on a tiebreaker at 18 points over Cortland on the third tiebreaker of record against common opponents beginning at the top (Oswego was 1-0-1 against top-seeded Plattsburgh, while Cortland was 0-2-0 against the Cardinals).
Drew Kopek (Rome/Syracuse Valley Eagles U19) scored the lone Cortland goal, with
Grace Karakas (Duluth, MN/Duluth East) and
Kayla Persinger (Youngstown/Newark Ironbound U22AAA) providing assists.
Eline Gillodes (La Saulce, France/Kents Hill) made 13 saves and allowed three goal in the first 27:53 in goal, while
Isabelle Deutz (Marshall, MN/Gentry Academy) made 14 saves and gave up two goals in the final 32:07 of action.
Tessa Morris finished with two goals and an assist for the Cardinals, while Maddy Stetson made 20 saves in goal for Plattsburgh.
Cortland had the first opportunity on the power play on the game just under three minutes into the first period, but the Cardinals kept the Red Dragons from recording a shot on goal with the player advantage.
Plattsburgh struck first with a little over five minutes left in the opening frame on a goal by Kate Conlon, assisted by Morris and Sydnee Francis, to give the Cardinals a 1-0 lead at the first intermission.
The Red Dragons had a controlling 15-9 advantage in shots on goal during the second period, but Morris was able to net two goals for Plattsburgh, the first just 2:03 into the period and another 7:53 into the frame.
Late in the period, Cortland went on the power play again after a body checking penalty by Plattsburgh, but Stetson made one save early in the penalty kill, and a Cardinal defender blocked a shot in the final second, to keep Cortland from capitalizing.
With nine minutes left in the third period, the Red Dragons committed a tripping penalty that allowed Plattsburgh to extend the lead to 4-0 with a power-play goal by Emily Kasprzak.
Cortland broke up the shutout bid with under two minutes remaining. Persinger kept the puck in the Cortland offensive zone at the left point and played the puck over to Karakas down the left boards. Karakas made a cross-ice feed to Kopek, who ripped a shot into the top right corner of the net from the right faceoff circle for her third goal of the season.
Plattsburgh added one goal in the final 30 seconds by Riley Keller to secure the win and the conference regular-season title.
