The Montreal Victoire took a 2-1 series lead against the back-to-back Walter Cup champion Minnesota Frost, pushing the champions to the brink of elimination with game four ready to drop the puck less than 24-hours after their most recent decision.
The Montréal Victoire scored two goals in a span of 24 seconds to push the Minnesota Frost to the brink of elimination. The back-to-back Walter Cup champions fell 2-1 to the regular season champion Montreal Victoire in Minnesota on Thursday.
Now the two will have no rest before facing off in a potentially deciding game four on Friday.
Minnesota blueliner Sidney Morin opened the scoring sending a low shot through traffic at evaded Ann-Renee Desbiens.
In the second period however, a furious 24-second span changed the game. It started with former Frost defender Maggie Flaherty collecting her own rebound and scoring on a wraparound shot beating Maddie Rooney.
Only 24 seconds later, Hayle Scamurra struck with a high shot that bet Rooney over the shoulder from the right face-off dot.
From there on out the Victoire shut down the attack and Desbiens made 27 saves to keep the score at 2-1 and give Montreal their first postseason series lead in franchise history.
“I think we can be really proud of what we've brought this year and what we've been growing and developing, in terms of taking pride in keeping the puck out of our net," said Montreal head coach Kori Cheverie. "Certainly tonight, we had to play with some desperation there. We know that Minnesota is a highly offensive team, and in order to shut them down, we all have to be on the same page, and certainly, some desperation shot blocks come along with that.”
“It was a good hockey game, I thought, both ways," said Minnesota head coach Ken Klee. "They scored goals in back-to-back shifts in about – it felt like – 30 seconds. All of a sudden, we blinked and we were up [1-0] then down 2-1, but I loved our resilience. I loved how hard we played. Obviously, our power play expects a lot of themselves, and I know they were disappointed and a little frustrated with not being able to capitalize, but we know it’s going to be a tight game. We had a great look at the end to try and tie it up, and it’s just one game. We’ve been here before. For us, we know it’s a long series, and we just have to bring our best tomorrow night.”