It took nearly 45 minutes, but Annika Neufeld-Kreider was able to score one goal in the 2-0 victory for the Oswego State women’s hockey team over Buffalo State Saturday afternoon.

Rachel Farmer earned her third shutout of the season after making 27 saves in net, including 14 in the third period alone. Her shutout included a penalty shot late in the game when Avery Webster was called for freezing the puck. Megan Reukauf took the penalty shot but it was shoved wide by Farmer.

“She’s a kid who’s played in net a long time. She’s seen all of these opponents. None of this is a surprise,” head coach Diane Dillon said. “All three of [our goaltenders] are capable, but I think Rachel had the experience and we knew that these were big points.”

Neufeld-Kreider’s goal, a deflected goal that was assisted by Skylar Byrne, who took the original shot, and Sara Cruise, was her fourth of the season. She is tied for the lead in goals for rookies on the Lakers along with Cruise and Avery Webster.

“We talked a lot about getting traffic in front of a smaller goaltender and a pretty fiery goaltender,” Dillon said. “We changed our positioning a little bit today, so you saw we had opportunities at second and third whacks at pucks.”

Cruise sealed the win with a short-handed empty-net goal with 14 seconds left in the game. Dillon said the strong forechecking in the neutral zone, starting with Cruise and sophomore Emma Morisette, was a key factor in getting that second goal.

Dillon talked about how the forecheck was focusing on its one forward, what the team calls “F1,” to enter the opposing team’s defensive zone with more intelligence, and the second forward, “F2,” making sure any passes up the boards are clogged up.

“When our forecheck is effective, we’re very, very good,” Dillon said. “When we’re mediocre we give up the whole neutral zone or easy breakouts into the neutral zone.”

While Oswego State was able to get the short-handed goal, the team did take four penalties in the third period alone to put some stress on Farmer and the penalty killing units. Dillon said discipline will be key heading into the rest of the regular season, and that the game against Buffalo State showed how young the team is and it does not “know how to win yet.”

“One of the things we’ve been talking about since December is our lack of discipline,” Dillon said. “You can yell at the refs all day long if you want. But you can’t be putting yourselves in position of slashing, hooking, taking penalties on the power play, offensive zone penalties, and then the just plain selfish stuff when you’re taking a retaliation shot at someone because they called your mother something.”

With only two goals today, the offensive production woes continue for the Lakers, who are averaging only 2.2 goals per game. Dillon said the chances have been there, but the team has been snakebitten a lot between hitting posts or “holding [their] sticks a little tight.” In the game, there was a close chance in the game that looked like it might have gone in the net, but it was waived off.

Also in the scoring woes for Oswego State, the power play was not successful at all in its four chances — including an extended 5-on-3 power play during the end of the second period.

“We’ve been struggling to score, that’s pretty clear. So anytime we’re that close, it’s just frustrating,” Dillon said. “We’re not going to blow away a lot of these goaltenders …  It’s not going to be pretty. It’s the ugly goals, and that’s what we’re trying to accomplish.”

Dillon said heading into the game, after the loss to the Bengals on Friday, the game was a “must-win.” With how little the conference is, only five teams including nationally-ranked Plattsburgh State, every game is crucial. The teams are only spread out by five or six conference points.

“Once you take Plattsburgh out of the mix, everybody [in the division] is stacked up like dominoes,” Dillon said.

Now, the team has to prepare for an unusual change in the schedule with a mid-week matchup against SUNY Cortland on Wednesday. On Feb. 13, the Lakers will take on SUNY Cortland again for the fourth and final matchup against the Red Dragons. In between those two games, the Lakers will take on Williams College for a non-conference weekend.

Dillon said with the mid-week game will give the team an insight of what future years in the Northeast Women’s Hockey League will bring, since SUNY Canton and Morrisville State will be joining the conference for the 2019-2020 season.

Next season, the Lakers will most likely have a mid-week game and then a following weekend series since the league commissioner wants to avoid Sunday games with the addition to the conference.

“That’s never been done in hockey,” Dillon said. “Three games in four days? That’s a little tough. We’ll see how it goes.”

After the weekend series split against Buffalo State, the Lakers improve to 9-7-3 overall with a 4-6-2 NEWHL record. The team has four conference games left in its regular season schedule. With how the next weeks will go with mid-week games and fast-paced weekends, Dillon said it will be tough.

“It’s a learning curve for us,” Dillon said. “[But] that’s eight more divisional points that we need.”

Photo by: Maria Pericozzi | The Oswegonian