Janie Boschma

A slow start resulted in a big win for the women’s hockey team Saturday.

After losing to the University of St. Thomas (Minn.) 3-1 at home Friday night, UW-Eau Claire came back the next night to shut out St. Mary’s University (Minn.) 4-0, bringing the Blugolds’ season record to 2-2.

Despite losing Friday, Eau Claire managed to outshoot the Tommies 37-23, and sophomore Amanda Alioto said that momentum carried over to Saturday.

“We played a really great game last night, so we were just trying to work off that,” she said.

Alioto put the first puck in the net for the Blugolds Saturday, scoring off an assist from freshman Shannon Nelson with six seconds left in the first period.

After a quiet second period, Eau Claire put in three goals during power plays in the third.

“We just skated a lot harder a lot smarter in the third and that caused them to take penalties and after that we could just put the puck in the net,” freshman Maddi Hammer said.

Hammer scored the first power play goal for the Blugolds off an assist from freshman Christine Knop just over eight minutes into the third.

Then Christine Dickinson set up Katie Lawler at the 14:02 mark to make the score 3-0.

That wasn’t it for the ‘Golds, however, who scored again less than two minutes later when junior Lauren Havard put the puck in the net to put Eau Claire up 4-0. Lawler and junior Margaret Campbell had the assists.

Coach Mike Collins and Hammer agreed this year will be a rebuilding year for the team.

Of the 21 players on the roster, only two are juniors, and the rest are freshman or sophomores.

“I think we got a great group of kids that in time we could be very good team,” Collins said. “But it will take time and I have to keep reminding myself to be patient.”

Hammer and Alioto agreed this year’s team has a lot of talent and it can only increase in future seasons.

“I think our team has, more than anything, potential,” Hammer said. “Being such a young team all we can do is go up from here.”