Oswego State’s struggles continued on Wednesday night, this time falling at the hands of SUNY Cortland 2-0.

The shutout was the Lakers fourth straight as they head into their final two regular season games this weekend against SUNY Potsdam. The game puts the Lakers in fourth place in the NEWHL, needing two wins this weekend to avoid playing Plattsburgh State in the first round of the playoffs. The Lakers starting lineup consisted of freshmen Sara Cruise, Skylar Byrne, and Annika Neufeld-Kreider, the usual second line.

“We tried to match lines with Cortland,” Dillon said. “We tried to put the speed of Sara Cruise against that top line of theirs.”

Freshman Cassie Shokar got her third straight start in net, getting the nod over former SUNY Cortland goaltender Rachael Farmer. Shokar ended with 18 saves on 20 shots.

“I thought she played okay,” Dillon said. “The two goals were rebound goals where they shot low off the pad. Those are tough to control. Cassie made some nice saves. Problem was, there was a lot of traffic in front of her.”

The first period got off to a bit of a slow start with both teams testing each other out. Jean-marie Padden had two opportunities for the Lakers denied by SUNY Cortland goalie Chelsea Allain. One of those opportunities actually saw the puck find the back of the net, but the play was blown dead even with the protest of Lakers head coach Diane Dillon.

Even with the good chances created by Padden, she also committed two penalties, one of which would be costly. A boarding call on Padden with just 1:25 remaining in the first would lead to a Red Dragons goal by Carly Weigold with just 43 seconds remaining in the period. The shot was deflected after an initial rifle from Emily Rose from the point. The Red Dragons would take the 1-0 lead into the locker room.

After Oswego State owned the chances for the first half of the second period, SUNY Cortland broke free for a goal with 7:39 remaining in the second. The goal came from Red Dragons leader Katie Devoe on a three on two assisted by Amanda Gaffney and Grace Schnorr. The assists marked the third this season for both Gaffney and Schnorr against the Lakers alone.

The second period saw an opening in power-play chances for the Lakers, but they were still unable to convert. The first chance came with 6:30 remaining in the second, but the Lakers were unable to muster much of anything against the Red Dragon’s penalty kill unit. The second power-play opportunity came with 2:13 remaining in the period. Once again, the Lakers failed to come up with much of anything in terms of scoring chances.

“You saw when we had opportunities to score, we were shooting high in the glove,” Dillon said. “There is no second chance there.”

The third period did not see much action in terms of chances, but Oswego State attempted to put some pressure on early. However, penalties would once again be the downfall for the Lakers, as they once again committed two in the period. The final came with just over two minutes remaining and was the third again Padden. SUNY Cortland would not score in the final period but left the Marano Campus Center with a 2-0 win in pocket. The aforementioned Padden had an up-and-down game, committing three penalties while also having good scoring opportunities.

“She has to be on the ice to create some offense, but she has to be more disciplined,” Dillon said. “I will say that second call I thought was terrible, but with the other two we can’t have one of our top offensive players in the box.”

Oswego State now finds themselves needing to win both games to avoid the fourth seed, and even the risk of missing the NEWHL playoffs as Buffalo State has a chance to pass the Lakers if they could pull off two wins to end the season paired with two Oswego State losses. That being said, the Lakers will have to have a short memory with a game in just two days.

“We need to figure a few things out. While we have to have short memories, we also have to make sure we learn from this,” Dillon finished.