TROY, NY – The Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) women's ice hockey team will make its third appearance in the ECAC Hockey playoffs this weekend, heading to Hamden, Conn., for a best-of-three quarterfinals against Quinnipiac University. The Engineers, who are in their fourth season as a member of the ECACH, enter as the fifth-seed and will play the fourth-seeded Bobcats, beginning Friday at 4pm at the TD Bank Sports Center. Game times for Saturday and Sunday's (if necessary) contests are scheduled for 2pm.

Under the direction of seventh-year head coach John Burke, Rensselaer posted a 14-13-6 overall record and an 11-7-4 mark in ECACH play. The Engineers, who finished with a conference record above .500 for the second straight season, currently have the 12th best scoring defense in the nation (2.09 goals allowed per game) and rank 11th nationally on the penalty kill (86.9%).

Seniors Whitney Naslund (Bloomington, MN/Bloomington Jefferson) and Allison Wright (Oakville, ON/Oakville Ice) lead the Engineers in scoring through 33 games. Both have tallied 23 points on the season. Naslund, who has a team-best 14 goals and nine assists, has also posted team-highs in power play goals (6) and game-winning markers (3). An ECAC Hockey Player of the Week selection, she has eight goals and four assists in 22 league contests. The program's all-time leader in career games played (137), Naslund recently became the first Division I player and just the seventh in program history to reach 100 career points (48-54-102).

Wright has posted 11 goals and is second on the team in assists with 12. She has scored two goals on the power play and also leads the team in game-winning tallies (3) and shorthanded goals (1). One of the team's most consistent players, she is tied with Naslund in career games played, having played all 137 contests in her career. In 22 ECAC Hockey contests, she has eight goals and eight assists for a team-high 16 points. Wright currently ranks 16th nationally in shorthanded tallies and is 27th overall in game-winners.

In goal, junior Sonja van der Bliek (Toronto, ON/Toronto Jr. Aeros) has seen the majority of time, posting a 13-13-5 overall record with an 10-7-4 ECAC Hockey mark. She has a 1.94 goals against average and a .922 save percentage in 1822:38 minutes of action. She has 695 saves, including four games with at least 30 stops. van der Bliek is the program's all-time career record holder in a number of categories, including games played (81), games started (80) and wins (40-30-11).

Friday's contest marks the Engineers' third of the season against the Bobcats, who are 18-8-8 overall, 11-4-7 in league play. In the first meeting (Oct. 31), freshman Heather Hughes tallied a hat-trick and added an assist as Quinnpiac cruised to a 6-1 win at the TD Bank Sports Center. The re-match at the Houston Field House on January 29 saw Kendra Dunlop (Granum, AB/Warner Hockey School) scored in the third period and RPI held on for a 1-0 victory.

In preparation the Engineers will practice at 4:15pm on both Monday and Wednesday and 2:15pm on Thursday at the Houston Field House. All games in the series will be broadcast live on the air courtesy of 91.5 FM, WRPI and online at www.wrpi.org. Live stats for this weekend's games are expected to be available at http://www.quinnipiacbobcats.com/.