Gopher Women Skate Past Ohio State

COLUMBUS, Ohio (Gophersports.com) - The No. 1 Minnesota women's hockey team improved to 5-0-0 with a 7-2 win over Ohio State (2-3-0, 0-3-0 WCHA) at OSU Ice Rink Friday night. Sarah Potomak led the Golden Gophers with four assists, and Dani Cameranesi scored twice in the win.

The Gophers and Buckeyes exchanged first-period tallies and headed into the first intermission tied 1-1 before Minnesota scored six-straight goals, including a four-goal second period. OSU scored again with 1.3 seconds remaining as the Gophers won 7-2.

"It was a good win here on the road tonight," head coach Brad Frost said. "It was kind of a slow start for us, but I'm happy with the way we responded in the second period and started to generate more things offensively."

Along with multi-point efforts from Potomak and Cameranesi, Cara Piazza recorded two points on one goal and one assist, and Hannah Brandt and Megan Wolfe each finished with two assists. OSU received goals from Cara Zubko and Claudia Kepler.

Amanda Leveille made 16 saves and improved to 3-0-0 on the season. The Gophers outshot the Buckeyes, 42-18, but saw their season-opening shutout streak come to an end at 264:43. OSU's Stacy Danczak made 21 saves on 26 shots in 34:32 before Alex LaMere stopped 14 of 16 shots in the final 25:28.

The Gophers were one-for-five on the power play and held Ohio State scoreless on three opportunities with the man advantage, remaining a perfect 11-for-11 on the penalty kill this season.

Minnesota (5-0-0, 3-0-0 WCHA) got on the board first when Kate Schipper scored her second goal of the season to give the Gophers a 1-0 lead on the team's first power play of the game. She buried a feed from Cameranesi and Potomak, but OSU's Zubko tied it up 1-1 with just 11.2 seconds remaining in the first period. Leveille could not get a hold of the puck in a pile-up in front of her net, and the loose puck popped out to Zubko, who fired a shot through traffic and beat Leveille on her glove side.

"I didn't like that we gave up goals at the end of the first and the end of the game, but those are things that we'll correct and hopefully do better tomorrow," Frost said.

Minnesota erupted for four goals in the second period to take a 5-1 lead into the second intermission. Cameranesi scored twice, and the Gophers also received goals from Piazza and Brook Garzone.

Sophie Skarzynski scored her first collegiate goal at 3:49 of the third period before Nina Rodgers finished off the scoring for the Maroon & Gold at the 9:47 mark. The Buckeyes got on the board again at 19:59 on Kepler's first goal of the season.

The Gophers and Buckeyes meet in game two of the series at 1 p.m. CT Saturday afternoon at OSU Ice Rink.

(Source: Gophersports.com)