Huskies put up fight, Stingers take victory 4-0

Top seeded Concordia advances to U Sports tourney semifinal

Emilie Lussier celebrates her second of two goals for the Stingers.

The Concordia University Stingers winning pedigree came through.

On Thursday night in a quarter-final contest at the U Sports Women’s Hockey Championship tournament, the top seeded Stingers absorbed the best shot from the pesky eighth seeded host University of Saskatchewan Huskies. The Stingers proceeded to play skilled and physical and slowly took the contest away from the Huskies causing a raucous crowd 2,364 spectators at Merlis Belsher Place to fall quite.

When the dust settled, the Stingers blanked the host Huskies 4-0 to advance to the semifinal round. Concordia will play the fourth seeded University of Waterloo Warriors in Saturday’s first semifinal set for 4 p.m. at Merlis. That clash will see the Reseau du Sport Etudiant du Quebec champions in the Stingers face the OUA champions in the Warriors.

Emmy Fecteau scored the Stingers first goal on Thursday.

The Huskies will take on the St. Francis Xavier X-Women in consolation semifinal set for 10 a.m. on Saturday.

“That one stings for sure,” said Huskies captain Kennedy Brown, who is in her fifth and final year of U Sports eligibility. “I mean it didn’t feel like a 4-0 game on our part.

“I think the girls battled really hard. We knew we were coming up against some steep competition them being ranked number one in the country coming off an undefeated regular season. To instill a little bit of fear in them early on and get a couple of chances, I mean that is all we can ask for from our team.

“We pop a couple of those early on, and it is a completely different game for us. For them to get a lucky bounce on that first one, it was definitely not the outcome we wanted. I mean I couldn’t have asked for more of an effort from the girls.”

Isabella Pozzi brings the puck up ice for the Huskies.

The Stingers came into Thursday quarter-final with a history of having won the U Sports title in 2022 and having fallen in the U Sports championship game a year ago to the Mount Royal University Cougars. This season, the Stingers posted a perfect 25-0 record in the regular season and a 4-2 mark in the post-season that saw them capture the RSEQ title.

The Huskies finished fourth in the Canada West Conference with a 19-7-2 mark and fell in a best-of-three conference quarter-final series in a series deciding Game 3 to the U of Calgary Dinos 2-0.

Backed by a vocal home crowd that was the largest to see a women’s hockey game in Saskatchewan’s history outside of contests involving Canada’s Senior National Women’s team, the Huskies came flying out of the gate. They had numerous quality scoring chances in the first period holding a 11-7 edge in shots on goal.

Part of the crowd of 2,364 cheers on the Huskies.

The Stingers exited the frame with the only goal coming from the stick of captain Emmy Fecteau. On a delayed penalty call situation, Fecteau took a shot from the right faceoff dot in the U of S zone, and the puck deflected off a Huskies skater, flipped high in the air and floated over top of Huskies star goaltender Camryn Drever into the net to give the Stingers a 1-0 lead.

Huskies head coach Steve Kook said it was tough to exit the opening 20 minutes down 1-0 on the scoreboard with his side having played well in the frame.

“The plan was to always take our swing at these guys,” said Kook. “We had nothing to lose.

Camryn Drever made 37 saves in goal for the Huskies.

“You look at the first period, we hit a post on an empty net. (Bronwyn) Boucher hits a crossbar. On the power play, SK (Sara Kendall) slides it through their goalie’s five-hole, hits the back leg and comes back out.”

Kook said he could sense the crowd at Merlis really wanted to erupt with noise, and he thought the outcome of the contest could have gone a different way had the Huskies scored in that frame.

“I think if we get one we get multiples, especially with the crowd the way it was,” said Kook. “We haven’t played in front of this size of a crowd, and I don’t think they’ve played in front of this size of a crowd either.

Rosalie Begin-Cyr scored the Stingers second goal on Thursday.

“I seriously thought if we would have got one we would have got more.”

The Stingers began to take control of the contest coming out of the first intermission. At the 3:12 mark of the second, fifth-year right-winger Rosalie Begin-Cyr popped home an insurance goal that gave the Stingers a 2-0 edge.

In the third, first-year left-winger Emilie Lussier scored to push the Stingers advantage out to 3-0. She added an empty-net goal to round out the 4-0 final in the Stingers favour with 40.6 seconds remaining in the frame.

“I think it was a really, really fun game to play and be a part of,” said Stingers head coach Julie Chu, who was named the U Sports coach of the year on Wednesday. “We have some experience in that locker room, but we also have a really young team in other aspects of it.

Kara Kondrat brings the puck up ice for the Huskies.

“I think for us we know that we dodged a bullet in that first period. I think we needed to start on time. They definitely started on time.

“We were lucky that (netminder) Jordyn Verbeek did a great job for us in that first period. We know that we were lucky to come out 1-0 out of that. I liked our response in the second and in the third period.”

Verbeek stopped all 26 shots she faced to pick up the shutout win in goal for the Stingers. Centre Justine Yelle and left-winger Emilie Lavoie each had a pair of assists for Concordia.

Drever turned away 37 shots to take the setback in net for the Huskies.

A group of youngsters cheer on the Stingers.

Chu said her squad will turn their attention to the task at hand in the semifinal round, but her club was going to take in the spoils of victory on Thursday night.

“I think for us we’re going to enjoy this one for today,” said Chu. “It is not easy to win, and it is not easy to win against that team.

“It is a battle, and it was a battle tonight. They played really, really well. I know that we are really grateful to play here and then to be able to earn the win and have an opportunity to play in the semis on Saturday against Waterloo.

“I think for us we will enjoy it for now and do the right things in our rest and our recovery. Once we wake up, we are going to turn the page and start our preparation and our focus towards what we need to do on Saturday to be successful.”

The Stingers celebrate their win on Thursday night.

While the Huskies can’t play for a national title, Brown said she still wants to do what she can to play two more games with the U of S side before graduating from the U Sports ranks. The emotion of how tough it was to fall to the Stingers was visible in the tears in Brown’s eyes, but she still wants to press on.

“That is kind of our focus now is just to if can draw out our season a little bit more, especially us as six years, us super vets,” said Brown. “We don’t want to be done by any means, so if we can play one more on Sunday, that would be a dream come true.

“We didn’t want to be on the consolation side of things, but that is the reality of a tournament like this. It is win or die. When you are ranking eighth and you know you are coming up against number one, those are some stiff odds to fight against.

“Our focus is to come out Saturday fresh and again just leave a mark, leave it all in the ice and hope to play on Sunday.”

James’ hat trick powers Warriors to 6-1 win

Tatum James (#88) celebrates her second goal on Thursday.

Tatum James was on fire for the University of Waterloo Warriors.

The third-year left-winger had a hat trick and one assist to power her Warriors to a 6-1 victory over the St. Francis Xavier X-Women in Thursday’s first quarter-final of the U Sports Women’s Hockey Championship tournament. The contest started out as a tight one with the fourth-seeded Warriors holding a 1-0 edge after 40 minutes before avalanching offensively in the third period.

James scored just 27 seconds into the contest to give the Warriors a 1-0 edge. After a scoreless second, the Warriors scored three straight goals to surge their advantage out to 4-0 before cruising to the 6-1 win at Merlis Belsher Place.

Defender Sarah Bestic scored at the 7:36 mark of the third to put the Warriors up 2-0. James added her second of the contest at the 11:33 mark of the third and completed her hat trick scoring a short-handed empty-net goal at the 16:20 mark of the frame.

Centre Ireland McCloskey tallied on the power-play for the X-Women at the 17:29 mark of the third to trim the Warriors lead to 4-1.

Tatum James had a hat trick and an assist on Thursday.

Left-wingers Carly Orth and Madison Pritchard rounded out the scoring with singles for the Warriors. James picked up an assist on Pritchard’s power-play tally.

Mikayla Schnarr stopped 20 shots to pick up the win in goal for the Warriors, who are the OUA champions. Amaya Giraudier turned away 22-of-27 shots to take the setback in net for the X-Women, who are the tournament’s fifth seed. Giraudier, who is in her third year with the X-Women, is an alumna of the Swift Current Innovation Federal Credit Union Wildcats under-18 AAA team.

The X-Women play in a consolation semifinal at 10 a.m. at Merlis against the eight seed and host University of Saskatchewan Huskies. The Warriors advance to play in a semifinal against the top seeded Concordia University Stingers at 4 p.m. at Merlis. The Stingers are the champions of Reseau du Sport Etudiant du Quebec.

The second set of the quarter-finals are set for Friday at Merlis. The Canada West champion University of British Columbia Thunderbirds, who are the second seed, face the Universite de Montreal Carabins, who are the seventh seed, at 1 p.m.

The Warriors celebrate their win on Thursday.

The AUS champion University of New Brunswick Reds, who are the third seed, take on the University of Toronto Varsity Blues, who are the sixth seed, at 7 p.m.

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