Weekend Watch | Special teams showdown at the forefront
Toronto, Ont. (via 49 Sports) - The women's hockey season in the OUA is past the one third mark, as teams continue to look for positive finishes in the first half of the season. With just a few weeks left before the winter break, there are a few special things to watch this weekend in OUA women's hockey
Can the Badgers break out of their slump?
It's been a rough couple of weeks for the Brock Badgers. After grinding out a 2-1 shootout win over Queen's on October 29, the Badgers have lost five straight games in November - including a 4-3 shootout loss in this week's midweek matchup against Guelph - and slid to fifth in the OUA West Division.
What might be most frustrating for the Badgers though, is not just that they are losing but how they are losing. Brock went from blowing a 1-0 lead in the final thirty seconds against Queen's on November 4, and losing 2-1 in overtime to getting shutout 1-0 by Ontario Tech the next night. The following weekend the Badgers took the 1-0 lead over Windsor with eight minutes to play but allowed four goals in the next five minutes to ultimately lose 4-2 before following that up with a 3-0 loss to York.
To put the icing on the cake, the Badgers took a 3-0 lead after the first period against the Gryphons on Wednesday night. Yet, they were outshot 14-9 over the final two periods and slowly saw their lead whittle away before Jaime Magoffin tied it for Guelph with 90 seconds to play, and Chihiro Suzuki gave the Gryphons the shootout win.
All told, it has been a tough month for the defending McCaw Cup champions, but they get one more game this weekend to try and break their losing skid. It will be just about the toughest challenge possible, though, as the Badgers head to Columbia Ice Field on Saturday, November 19, for a matchup with the still undefeated Waterloo Warriors.
What is there to say that has not already been said about Waterloo early on this season? The Warriors have been dominant so far and lead the OUA West Division by six points with a game in hand on the second-place Guelph Gryphons.
Led by the OUA's top scorers in Leah Herrfort (seven goals, five assists) and Tatum James (five goals, seven assists), the Warriors have the most goals in the OUA at 27 through eight games. Meanwhile, Kara Mack (3-0-0, 0.66 GAA, .974 SV%) and Mikayla Schnarr (5-0-0, 1.00 GAA, .960 SV%) have together allowed just a pair of goals in November. In last week's matchups, Mack picked up the 1-0 shutout win over TMU, while Schnarr followed up the next night with another 1-0 win over Western.
Special teams duel on tap between Ontario Tech and Queen's
The two top powerplays in the OUA square off this weekend as the Ontario Tech Ridgebacks, who hold the number one spot at 33.2%, take on the Queen's Gaels, who hold the number two slot at 29.4%, in a home-and-home series that kicks off on Friday night in Oshawa.
The game to watch in particular is on Saturday night at the Memorial Centre at Queen's as the Ridgebacks' powerplay away from home sits at a scorching 43.8% to lead the league. Still, at the same time, the Gaels' penalty kill has yet to give up a goal on home ice this season, going a perfect five-for-five.
For the Ridgebacks, the power play offence comes from a three-headed monster. Mackenzie Krasowski and Kate Mikkelson sit tied for second in the conference with a pair of powerplay goals each, while Nicole Escano has a conference-leading five powerplay assists to go along with a goal herself.
On the other side, Queen's is paced by Emma Michalicka with a pair of powerplay assists and five different players with a goal each.
With both Ontario Tech and Queen's chasing the Nipissing Lakers for second in the OUA East division, a pair of wins against the other would provide a significant opportunity to make up ground.
