RPI Women tie RIT, 1-1
TROY >> The RPI women’s hockey team has been pretty dominant in their lifetime career against the Rochester Institute of Technology, but Friday’s matchup between the Engineer’s and Tiger’s did not sway one way or another.
“It’s frustrating because that is a team that we know we can beat and even our last tie we should have had that game,” said Captain Jaimie Grigsby. “It’s so annoying. But, hopefully we get them tomorrow.”
RPI tied RIT 1-1, making the lifetime series between the two programs 10-2-2 in favor of RPI.
Friday’s player to stick out was once again Lovisa Selander, who continues to be a dominant force in between the pipes for RPI.
“We have the utmost confidence in Ovie,” said Grigsby. “What can we say, she has saved us for so long so even if one does go in that’s our fault we need to get a couple more for her in the game.”
Selander finished with 33 saves. Her RIT opposite, Terra Lanteigne, finished with 36 saves on the night.
“That goalie tonight was throwing out juicy rebounds,” said Grigsby. “They were all over the place.”
The first period came and went
pretty quickly to kick things off.
RIT got on the board early for the Tiger’s thanks to a shot in tight on Selander that just squeaked by about ten minutes into the period.
Both Selander and Grigsby noticed some on and off play from the team.
“There was a couple of times we let some odd man rushes in and we are usually a pretty good team at that,” said Grigsby. “I don’t know what happened.”
The first came and went for Selander as well, who despite seeing 12 shots, felt like she didn’t get all too much action in the period.
“I didn’t get a whole lot of shots, I feel like I only had two shots in the first ten minutes, which is a bit weird for me,” said Selander.
The second period was once again a little on and off for the Engineer’s, even for Selander. A fluttering puck hit Selander’s shoulder, bounced high in the air, and almost into the back of the net. Luckily she was saved by teammates, who rushed to keep the puck from crossing the goal line.
“I feel like I had a few weird little bounces, but I got back into it in the second half of the period and the third,” said Selander, who knows how to make a quick turn around and refocus herself.
“I think you have to trust that you know what you are doing. It’s my fourth year now so I am getting more used to it. You just have to figure out a way to stay in it,” said Selander.
RPI ended up scoring their goal in the second period when Grigsby caught Sabrina Repaci crashing to the front of the net. Grigsby threw the puck at the net, where Repaci tipped the shot past RIT’s Lanteigne.
“I just saw Paci going to the net hard and that is the play we have worked on all week, actually all season for us a line, we keep running it,” said Grigsby. “We have that strong middle lane drive and it worked out so we were really happy.”
The Engineer’s continued crashing the front of the net and getting chippy in search of the second goal of the game.
“That’s how we are going to score goals, that’s our area,” said Grigsby. “Right outside the blue paint is where we are going to get all of our goals.”
RPI and RIT face off again Saturday at 3 p.m. at Houston Field House. The Engineer’s sound pretty confident that game two will turn out a little different. “I think we can get 50 tomorrow and just need to be there for those rebounds. They’re there. They’re there waiting for the taking,” said Grigsby. “We need to outwork them for sixty minutes and not take any time off, or one shift off, and come together as a team for 60-65 minutes.” Selander agreed. “We definitely had periods where we looked really good and periods we looked really shaky,” said Selander. “I think for tomorrow we just need to get sixty minutes going. We know we can beat this team and we just need to play hard and our game.”