After having their three-game winning streak snapped on Friday in Toronto, Montreal managed to hang on for a 2-1 win versus first-time visitors – Minnesota, in Laval.
It was a quick turnaround for both teams as Montreal played Friday night at Scotiabank Arena and Minnesota played Saturday night in Ottawa. Montreal secured the win and Minnesota was missing one of their best players, Taylor Heise, who didn’t make the trip to Canada due to an upper-body injury.
“With that many fans in the stands these games are important to us”, Montreal head coach Kori Cheverie told me. ” The great thing with this team is that we can implement things pretty quickly and that is something we continue to preach and honestly it was a few things we needed to tidy up and it’s a big focus for us.”
Entering the game Montreal had gone 1 for 31 on the powerplay which came out to a success rate of only 3%. They improved on it early in the game as the visitors were penalized less than two minutes in when Emma Greco was called for tripping. Claire Dalton managed to tip a shot from Kati Tabin into the back of the net for the early lead and a powerplay goal.
In French Cheverie started the press conference by stating ” Enfin l’ advantage numerique and we don’t need to ask any questions about the powerplay.
Minnesota responded late in the first period as Kendall Coyne Schofield got a quick pass from Claire Butorac and managed to backhand a puck top shelf past Elaine Chuli who got the start and made 21 saves to keep a perfect record of 4-0.
” It’s nice because I don’t need to worry about our goaltending and it’s easy with the goalie tandem that we have and they make our job a lot easier and Chuli did what she needed to do and when you have a goalie tandem like that it’s pretty scary but for our coaching staff we like it.”
In the second period, Montreal got into a bit of penalty trouble getting back-to-back penalties but was able to kill them both off and with six minutes left in the second period Sarah Lefort scored the game-winning goal when she was able to put a juicy rebound into the back of the net off a shot from Minnesota native Madison Bizal.
” Honestly it was time”, Lefort answered when asked about her goal in French post-game. ” An amazing crowd with an incredible team so it’s a first and we will see for the next game.”
In the third and final frame, we saw the visitors push for the equalizer but Montreal shut them defensively, and with less than a minute left and the visitors net empty the five players on the ice spent the rest of the game blocking shots and making sure no pucks got through.”
” Every game we want to win”, Lefort told me when I asked her if it was a bounce-back game. ” We come in and prepare for 60 minutes of hockey and we were looking to win today.”
I asked Dalton post-game how it felt to score a powerplay goal on home ice and she was elated that she was able to score her second goal of the season.
” It’s cool to get one on the powerplay”, Dalton answered. ” It’s something we have been focusing on and try to be competitive in this league with a strong powerplay.”
Before the game, it was announced that after signing two separate 10-day contracts Catherine Dubois had signed a full player contract for the rest of the season and she admitted post-game to the Montreal media it was an issue she was stressing about and that when it happened she was very emotional.
” It’s a childhood dream”, she responded in French. ” I am very happy and very relieved and it was a lot of stress not knowing what was going to happen.”
On the other side of the spectrum, we also found out that Dominika Laskova today was placed on LTIR or Long-Term Injury Reserve and Cheverie couldn’t confirm when we would see her back in the lineup. Montreal is back in action on Wednesday when they hit the road again and head to New York to play at UBS Arena.
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Featured Image ©️ Professional Women’s Hockey League (PWHL)
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