The Colgate women’s hockey team suffered a 6-2 defeat to the Dartmouth Big Green last Friday night in their third ECAC Hockey game of the season. The Raiders played again the following afternoon against the tenth-ranked Harvard Crimson. Colgate fell to Harvard 3-1 despite having an early lead. The team now has a 1-3 record in the ECACHL, bringing them to 3-7 overall.

Colgate did not get off to a great start in the Dartmouth game, as Sash Nanji scored the first goal just 13 seconds in, giving the Big Green a 1-0 lead right off the bat. The Raid­ers, however, retaliated at the 5:47 mark when sophomore Brittany Philips beat her defender to the puck, skated around the goal and passed the puck up to senior Jessi Waters. Waters then quickly passed the puck on to first-year Rachel Walsh, who hammered it past Dartmouth’s goaltender to even the score at one.

Unfortunately, Colgate’s momentum did not last. In the second period, Dartmouth scored three unanswered goals, giving the Big Green a decisive 4-1 lead over Colgate. The first goal came from Amanda Trunzo, who picked up a loose puck and sped down the ice to successfully beat Colgate’s senior goaltender Lisa Plenderleith. Erica Dobos added the sec­ond goal two minutes later, and the third came on a wrister by Reagan Fischer.

The Raiders did eventually stop Dart­mouth’s scoring streak. At the 18:58 mark of the second frame, junior Amanda Kir­wan made contact with sophomore Jordan Brickner, who then blasted the puck into the net to put the score at 4-2. Senior forward Jacquie Colborne also assisted Brickner for the Raiders’ second goal.

Although ‘Gate used the momentum from the second goal to stay on the offensive, the Big Green went on to score twice in the final stanza to earn the 6-2 victory. Plenderleith made 24 saves for the Raiders and Colgate finished 2-for-5 on the power play.

The following evening, the Raiders were off to a good start against the Crimson, taking a 1-0 lead at the 12:33 mark of the first period. Senior Hannah Milan passed the puck up to Phillips from the corner, who then slid a pass that was interrupted by a Harvard stick. For­tunately, the puck somehow found its way to sophomore Jenna Klynstra at the far post and she slammed it into the net for the lead.

Things began to turn south for Colgate during the second period, however. With the Crimson outshooting the Raiders 13-5, Har­vard eventually capitalized as Kate Buesser scored a goal at the 12:30 mark to even the score at 1-1 going into the third period.

Both Colgate and Harvard went into the fi­nal frame hungry for goals, yet it was the Crim­son who fed their appetite. Taking advantage of two solid scoring opportunities, Harvard added back-to-back tallies at the 5:14 and 10:43 marks of the final period of play, leading the Crimson to victory. Kalley Armstrong scored the game-winner off a rebound, and Leanna Coskren, who connected on a pass from Katharine Chute, added the third one. Raider goalie Kimberly Sass had 31 saves in the game, 11 more than Harvard’s Laura Bellamy.

“This weekend was challenging,” Klynstra said. “Harvard and Dartmouth are two skill­ful teams in our league and we knew we had our work cut out for us. Friday’s game didn’t turn out as well as we had hoped, but we re­focused and had a new mentality going into Saturday’s game. Again, the outcome wasn’t what we planned, but as a team we felt Sat­urday’s performance was a lot better. We are looking forward to this weekend to get some momentum back.”

This upcoming weekend, the Raiders will host the Niagara Purple Eagles for a two-game, non-conference series. Friday’s contest will begin at 3 p.m., while Saturday’s game is set to start at noon.