Ohio State Holds Off Minnesota To Sweep Series

Ohio State won two one-goal games this weekend against Minnesota in a battle of two top-five teams.

Two of the top teams in the nation, #2 Ohio State and #4 Minnesota, with Ohio State winning two hotly contested one-goal games. 

To open their series, playing in front of a sold-out crowd in Columbus, Ohio, the Ohio State Buckeyes needed overtime to win a 4-3 contest. Jennifer Gardiner, who was The Hockey News' 20th ranked prospect in THN's October PWHL Draft rankings, scored the overtime winner to hand Minnesota their first loss of the 2023-2024 NCAA season.

Hannah Bilka opened the scoring knocking home a shot from Gardiner, before Abbey Murphy answered with her first of two goals on the night for Minnesota. The teams continued to exchange goals with Gardiner also scoring in the third before finishing the game in OT.

In the second game of their WCHA weekend series, Ohio State won out on a high scoring 6-5 affair. In this game, Minnesota jumped out to an early 2-0 lead on goals from Ella Huber and Josefin Bouveng.

In the second period, Ohio State stormed back scoring three straight including two from Jocelyn Amos and one from Gardiner. After Nelli Laitinen scored a pair to keep Ohio State close, Stephanie Markowski would score the eventual game winner just over 12 minutes into the third. Ohio State peppered Minnesota goalie Skylar Vetter with 52 shots on the night. It was her second straight night facing more than 50 shots as Vetter faced 5-1 the day before.

Although the lost both, Minnesota took positives from sticking with last year's national championship runner up and 2022 champion.

"Certainly frustrated with the result here tonight, but at the same time very encouraged here early in the year," Minnesota head coach Brad Frost said. "We were down late, but generated some grade-A chances in the last 30 seconds to tie it up. We certainly have some things we can learn from and get better at, and we will do that, but again, I love the fight of this team."

Ohio State improves to 7-1-0 on the season while Minnesota dropped to 3-2-0.