UTICA, NY – After jumping out to a 2-1 first period lead the nationally-ranked No. 8 Utica College women's hockey team lost to No. 3 Middlebury College 4-2 Saturday afternoon at the Utica Memorial Auditorium.
Senior captain
Stephanie Price (River Rouge, MI/) opened the scoring when she netted her team-high fifteenth goal of the season 12:11 into the first period.
Jessica Leclerc (Augusta, ME/) and
Jill Nolan (Labrador, Newfoundland/) assisted on the goal.
Middlebury answered right back when Lacey Farrell (Greenwich Acad./ Greenwich, Conn.) beat UC goalie
Stephanie Yates (Garden Grove, CA/) to tie the game up at 1-1. Karen Levin (Niles North / Morton Grove, Ill.) assisted on the game-tying goal.
Andrea Maxon (Canton, NY/Hugh C. Williams), the college's reigning female athlete of the week, gave UC a 2-1 lead when she scored an even strength goal with 19 seconds left in the first period. Leclerc and Price assisted on the Pioneers' final goal.
Middlebury, who is the defending national champion, dominated the final forty minutes of play scoring three unanswered goals. Levin scored her sixth goal of the season 5:56 into the second period, assisted by Molly Vitt (Deerfield (Mass.) / Kenilworth, Ill.) and Tania Kenny (Malvern Collegiate / Toronto, Ont.), to tie the game at 2-2. Abby Kurtz-Phelan (East High / Denver, Colo.) scored what proved to be the game-winner with under three minutes left in the second period. Shannon Sylvester (Taft (Conn.) / Randolph, N.J.) assisted on the goal.
Sylvester scored an insurance goal 12:32 into the third period to close out the scoring. Annmarie Cellino (Nichols School / W. Seneca, N.Y.) assisted on the final goal.
Angie Todd (Kentwood / Kent, Wash.) made 24 saves in net for the Panthers to improve to 5-0-1 on the year, while Yates stopped 33 shots on the night. Her record falls to 5-3-2 on the season.
UC (10-3-2) returns to action at host RIT Wednesday night. The puck is scheduled to drop at 7 p.m. Middlebury (11-1-1) returns to action at RIT Sunday at 5:00 p.m. The Panther are unbeaten in their last 12 games.
# # #
