The New York Sirens had yet to play one team in the PWHL this season, the Ottawa Charge, and the two teams were meeting for the first time in the 2024-25 campaign at the Prudential Center on Dec. 29. Last season, this matchup was pretty evenly split with Ottawa going 2-1-1-0 and New York going 2-2-0-0 in the four matchups against each other. But the tale is much different for the two teams early this season. The Sirens are 2-1-1-1 and are currently the third best team in the league while the Charge is just 1-0-1-1 and occupy the last place in the standings.
Courtesy of PWHL
The first period was heavily dominated by the Charge as they poured the shots on and gave the Sirens goaltender, Corinne Schroeder, plenty of work to do early in the contest. The momentum translated into a goal just 6:15 into the game as Emily Clark scored her second of the season to give Ottawa the 1-0 lead. Just over two minutes later, the Sirens got the first power play opportunity of the game as Ronja Savolainen of the Charge received two minutes for holding, but the home team could not find the back of the net on the advantage. When Gabbie Hughes went to the box with about five minutes left in the period for tripping, New York’s power play was held off the scoresheet again. The first 20 minutes of play concluded with the 1-0 score.
The second period started out similarly with Ottawa taking an interference penalty but not allowing New York to score on the advantage. A funny sequence of events happened after the teams returned to 5-on-5 play. Shiann Darkangelo put a shot on net, but Schroeder cleared it just before one of her own teammates collided with her. As she was trying to reset in net, Darkangelo found the puck again and was able to put it in the net to make the score 2-0 Charge.
Katerina Mrazova added to the lead just over three minutes later by scoring her first of the season. All three of Ottawa’s goals came from right below or inside the left side circle. The Charge got their first power play opportunity at 12:21 in the second as Jamie Bourbonnais was given a two minute minor for slashing, but the Sirens killed off the penalty. After yet another Charge power play that was killed off, the Sirens got their fourth chance on the advantage but Emerance Maschmeyer, the Charge’s goaltender, stopped everything that came her way. The middle frame ended with the 3-0 score on the board in Ottawa’s favor.
Courtesy of PWHL
New York came out strong to start the third. Just 23 seconds in, Sarah Fillier scored her third of the season to avoid the shutout. Alex Carpenter picked up the secondary assist on that tally to extend her season-opening point streak to six straight games. With a 3-1 score now, the Sirens were fighting to get back in the game but the Charge kept the pressure on. Despite outshooting Ottawa 13-6 in the final frame, New York could not get anything else past Maschmeyer. 3-1 was the final score when the final buzzer sounded, giving the Charge their first road win of the season and the Sirens their second straight loss.
“We have a great game plan going into every game, every goalie, every opponent. Sometimes you don’t execute in the areas you want to execute even though we talked about it. We’re human, we have off moments and off nights and today wasn’t our night. We were able to find our game a little bit in the third which was great to build on, but just too little too late at that point.” said Sirens Head Coach Greg Fargo about the loss.
“In this league, every game feels like a must win. Essentially in every game you’re trying to get points because the points are going to matter in the end. But in the same breath, it’s a long season,” said Charge Head Coach Carla MacLeod. “I think for us right now, we’re facing a little bit of a different scenario because the World Junior Championship is in Ottawa and ourselves, the [Ottawa] Senators were displaced here for quite a lengthy time. Our first 11 of 15 games are on the road so we have to get comfortable on the road and we are. It just brings different sorts of variables and nuances that way, but our preparation wasn’t different. We were just more comfortable in our game plan and it showed today.”
The New York Sirens return to the ice on Jan. 4 when they take on the Minnesota Frost at Xcel Energy Center.
Comments