Colontino nets 50th victory as Lady Colonials defeat RIT
The Colonials started the season 1-0 after their 3-2 defeat of Providence Saturday.
The RMU women’s hockey team took on the RIT Tigers for the completion of a two-game series and the Colonials put their impressive 15-3-1 record as well as their outstanding eight game winning streak on the line as coach Paul Colontino searched for his 50th win.
The head coach of the Lady Colonials achieved that mark with a 4-2 victory Saturday afternoon at the Island Sports Center.
“I’m super proud of him,” said Kristen Richards, who scored the final goal for RMU. “He has done so much for this team and we have become better because of him.”
Both teams were very physical right out of the gate as a mixture of slashes and tripping resulted in two power plays for both teams early in the game.
RMU’s Jessica Dodds made 13 saves during a very defensive and offensive period.
The physical play continued in the second period as both teams took turns in the penalty box multiple times.
Although the Tigers tickled the twine twice, the Colonials responded with a pair of goals of their own by Brittany Howard and Maeve Garvey, respectively.
Both teams scored on the power play. Although the Tigers got a pair of tallies early in the period, the Colonials kept their composure and eventually tied it up.
“You just can’t panic when you are in situations like that when you are down one or two goals in the game,” said Garvey, who scored two goals for the Colonials in the second and third period. “Luckily we stuck to our system and came back to tie it up.”
The third period proved to be the turning point of the game as RMU put two goals in the net while holding the Tigers to only a few shots on net. With 10:24 left in the game, Garvey found the back of the net.
The Colonials took advantage of an empty net and added another goal by Kristen Richards.
“I wasn’t thinking about putting the puck in the goal as much as I needed to help my team,” said Richards. “I knew that goal was going to help them and I’m glad that I be a part of the win.”
With the win, the Colonials extend their winning streak to nine games going into the Christmas break.
“We were actually the underdogs coming into this season and it is nice to do what we have done and make a statement in this conference,” Garvey said. “We are going to go over a lot of stuff during the break and come back looking to get another win.”
