The Oswego State women’s hockey team’s season has come to a close, following a 6-1 Northeast Women’s Hockey League Championship loss at Plattsburgh State. The Cardinals have now won all three NEWHL Championship titles since the league came into existence. Despite the five-goal defeat, the Lakers played hard for a full sixty minutes of play.
“They kept battling,” head coach Diane Dillon said. “We never quit. You have to give Plattsburgh State credit, they are a very skilled team. They took away time and space from us. But we stuck to our game plan and kept plugging. We’re really proud of the effort the girls showed today.”
The Lakers got the scoring started on a snipe from the point off the stick of Philomena Teggert seven minutes into the game. Teggert finishes her junior year with a career-high 21 points.
“It’s always fun, a shot like that,” Dillon said. “That was a cannon. [Ashley Davis] never moved, you love that. It was nice to score first, and you feel that adrenaline through the bench. [Teggart] has been doing this all year long, so can you imagine what her senior year is going to be like?”
After the Teggert goal, the Cardinals answered with two goals in the first period to take a 2-1 lead into the locker room. Two goals in both the second and third periods rounded out the six Plattsburgh State goals. NEWHL Player of the Year Annie Katonka fired home the sixth and final goal for the Cardinals with four minutes left in the game.
Plattsburgh State peppered 55 shots on goal. Forty-nine of those were saved by Lakers goalie Rachael Farmer. Farmer stopped 20 of those shots in the first period.
“We’re thrilled she had such an outstanding career here with the Lakers,” Dillon said. “It was a tough decision for her to leave Cortland to come here and she did. She has been the backbone of our team this year and she was again today. There were a couple she wanted back today, but she made some key saves and was under pressure quite a bit.”
Oswego State had five power play opportunities but were unable to find the back on the net. Three of those chances came in the first 20 minutes of action. Plattsburgh State owns the best penalty kill in the nation, having killed off 98% of the opportunities.
“We held onto the puck a little too much on the power play,” associate head coach Mark Digby said. “When you’re playing a team that is so intelligently aggressive like Plattsburgh State, you have to move quickly to get them out of positions to create some lanes.”
In what was a very physical contest, nine total penalties were given out. The crowd inside the Ronald B. Stafford Ice Arena was vocal throughout the contest, but it was not just Cardinals fans making noise. A strong section of the 769 in attendance were wearing Lakers’ green and gold.
“We’ve got a legion of faithful fans,” Dillon said. “A lot of parents came up for the game. Everyone was coming for this one. We always want to make sure we put a good product on the ice for them.”
For the four seniors, the 6-1 loss marks the end of their careers at Oswego State. For the rest of the roster, it was great experience going forward. To play against the best team in the country with a spot in the NCAA Div. III Tournament on the line will prove valuable to the rest of the roster.
“When you look at the amount of time our freshmen played and to be in this situation, that’s important for the future of the program,” Digby said. “Certainly there will be a lot of talk this summer about hoisting that trophy and making it happen.”
Although this was not the outcome the Lakers wanted, the team returns eight of their top 10 scorers next season. The future seems to be bright for a program that has now made the NEWHL Championship in two of its three years in existence.
“We hope to be in this championship game from here on out,” Dillon said. “We earned our way here and we’re going to keep doing it.”
Photo by Matt Watling | The Oswegonian
