Box Score

TROY, N.Y. – Powered by a five-point game from freshman Taylor Horton (St. Thomas, ON/Bluewater Hawks), the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) women's hockey team earned its first ECAC Hockey win of the season, with a 10-4 victory over Colgate University. The Engineers improve to 3-5-3 overall and 1-1-1 in conference play, while the Raiders drop to 1-7-1 and 0-2-1 in ECAC Hockey.

Holding a 2-1 lead in the second stanza, Rensselaer broke open the contest with a five-goal effort in the second stanza. Senior Whitney Naslund (Bloomington, MN/Bloomington Jefferson) pushed the score to 3-1 at 6:51 with an excellent effort in front. Receiving the puck from Laura Gersten (Queensbury, NY/Troy-Albany Ice Cats), Naslund skated behind the net before redirecting back around in front and lifted a backhanded shot over the shoulder of Raiders goalie Kimberly Sass (East Amherst, NY/Buffalo Bison).

Senior Allison Wright (Oakville, ON/Oakville Ice) tallied the first of her two goals in the contest on the power play at 9:30 and sophomore Alisa Harrison (Vienna, VA/Washington Pride) followed with a tally at 12:02 pushing the Engineers lead to 5-1.

Rensselaer made it a 7-1 advantage less than two minutes later behind back-to-back goals by junior Sydney O'Keefe (Prior Lake, MN/Prior Lake). Scoring at 14:07, O'Keefe tallied her second at 16:11 after finding the puck in front off a shot by Gersten at the left point. Horton earned the assist on both of O'Keefe's goals.

Colgate cut the deficit to five (7-2) just 26 seconds later after senior Katie Stewart (Exeter, ON/Bluewater Jr. Hawks) was able to get the puck in between the post and the foot of RPI keeper Sonja van der Bliek (Toronto, ON/Toronto Jr. Aeros).

The Engineers came out firing once more in the third period, scoring three goals in the first seven minutes, including Horton's second of the game at 5:03. Sophomore Jill Vandegrift (St. Paul, MN/Minnesota Thoroughbreds) made it a 10-2 advantage at 7:02, but the Raiders continued to battle in the game.

Junior Jessi Waters (Menlo Park, CA/San Jose Sharks) converted on a power play at 8:59 to make it a 10-3 contest and Stewart added her second of the contest mid-way through the frame, but it wasn't enough as the Engineers held off Colgate for the victory.

Rensselaer, which outshot the Raiders (33-25) in the game, opened the scoring behind goals just seven seconds apart from sophomore Sierra Vadner (Apple Valley, MN/Minnesota Thoroughbreds) and Horton. Colgate's Beth Rotenberg (Toronto, ON/Toronto Jr. Aeros) tallied the visitor's first goal at 3:49 of the second period.

In goal, van der Bliek made 21 stops to pick up the victory, while Colgate saw all three of its netminders between the pipes. Sass picked up the loss, stopping nine shots. Junior Lisa Plenderleith (Ajax, ON/Durham Jr. Lightning) made 11 saves, while freshman Jocelyn Yokow (Windsor, CT/Choate Rosemary) had three stops.

The Engineers return to action tomorrow afternoon, when they host #10 Cornell at the Houston Field House (2:30pm). Colgate is also in action tomorrow with a contest at Union (2:30pm).