UTICA, NY- The Utica College women's hockey team is set to play a pair at home this Friday and Saturday as Stevenson University will hit the road to take on the Pioneers. Both game times are slated for 3 p.m. at the Adirondack Bank Center.
 
LAST TIME OUT: The Pioneers dropped game one of the two game set against Nazareth by a score of 3-1 last Friday... Utica gained a 1-0 advantage in the first period however, the Pioneers struggled to find the back of the net from there... Nazareth put up one in the second followed by two in the third en route to ending the Pioneers' three game winning streak... Rebecca Brown (Steamboat Springs, CO/Norwich University) scored the lone goal for Utica with assists given to Kayla Dion (Colchester, VT/Boston Shamrocks) and Katrina Cornick (Mason City, IA/Rocky Mountain Roughriders)... Game two of the weekend set was postponed due to weather.
 
OUT OF CHARACTER: The two goals scored by Nazareth in the third period last weekend were only the second and third goals scored on the Pioneers in the third period on the season... The last time UC gave up a third period goal came during its season opener against Becker College on Oct. 27.
 
WHERE WE STAND: UC currently sits third in the UCHC conference standings with a 9-2 record... The Pioneers are four points behind first place William Smith (22 points) and are tied with Elmira at 18 points... However, Elmira holds the advantage over UC based on its 9-0 conference record... Not far behind are Nazareth (8-3, 16 points) and Manhattanville (7-4-1, 15 points).
 
WELL BALANCED ATTACK: The Pioneers are 10th in the nation averaging 3.81 goals per game while also checking in at ninth with a 2.44 scoring margin (61 goals scored, 22 allowed).
 
SHARING THE PUCK: UC continues to play unselfish hockey as the team ranks ninth in the nation with 106 assists and eighth nationally with 6.63 assists per game... More impressively, the team's 106 assists are shared between 20 players with only one, Lexi Stanisewski (Lawrence, MA/Boston Shamrocks), having double-digits (11).
 
ON CLOUD NINE: Junior Rebecca Brown (Steamboat Springs, CO/Norwich University) is second on the squad with 17 points, just one behind Stanisewski for the team-lead… Brown does however rank first on the Pioneers with nine goals so far… She has five points (three goals, two assists) in her last three games and Utica is 7-1 this season when brown scores at least one goal.
 
EIGHT IS GREAT: Junior Olivia Hirschy (Fort Wayne, IN/Culver Academies) ranks second on the team with eight goals so far… Four of her eight goals have been game-winners and she is currently tied for third in the nation in game-winning goals this season.
 
SHUTDOWN DEFENSE: Senior Kirsten Johnson (Brockville, Ontario/RSL Midget Thunder AA) has overcome an injury-plagued start to her career to provide the Pioneers with a veteran presence on the blue line… Johnson has posted a career-high in assists (seven) and points (seven), and she also leads Utica with a plus/minus ratio of plus-13 through 16 games this season.  
 
SCOUTING STEVENSON: The Mustangs are 3-6-1 (7 points) in UCHC play and 6-10-1 overall... They own the fifth best scoring margin in the conference (-0.4) with 37 goals scored and 42 allowed on the season... Their offense runs through Kellen Wittman (13 goals and nine assists) and Nikki Kendrick (10 goals and 12 assists) as they both lead the team with 22 points each, tied for the ninth most in the UCHC... The team also ranks third nationally with 21 power play goals.
 
AGAINST THE MUSTANGS: Utica is 2-2-1 all-time against Stevenson… The Mustangs came away with a 2-1 win and then the teams skated to a 3-3 tie in their series in Owings Mills, MD last season. 
 
LOOKING AHEAD: The Pioneers will start February with a home-and-home set against first place William Smith College... UC will be at home on Friday, Feb. 2nd at 3 p.m. and will then quickly turnaround to play in Geneva on Saturday at 4 p.m.