Women's Hockey | 1/7/2019 1:11:00 PM
PITTSBURGH -- The leading scorer on the
Robert Morris women's hockey team has earned her third consecutive monthly award from College Hockey America, which the Colonials hope portends well for their pursuit of a third straight team title when their regular season resumes.
Despite a relatively quiet month for the team, which played only three of its CHA-high 22 games in December, junior forward
Jaycee Gebhard still made enough noise to take another CHA Player of the Month award, the conference announced Monday. Gebhard is the first player in RMU history to be named Player of the Month three times in a row in the same season.
Former teammate
Brittany Howard '18 was the last Colonial to earn three straight Player of the Month nods, taking those laurels for February, October and November of 2017.
The 5'3" assistant captain from Plenty, Saskatchewan led the circuit with four goals in those three games. Gebhard also finished atop CHA with her plus-3 rating for the month of December, and her 37 faceoff wins in that span, the most on the team, tied for third in the conference.
Gebhard registered a point in 14 consecutive games Oct. 20-Dec. 7, establishing a new Robert Morris record. On Dec. 4 she celebrated her second College Hockey America Player of the Month award in a row, as well as a CHA Player of the Week nod for her hat trick in a 4-1 win over conference rival Penn State Dec. 1, in which the new RMU point streak record was established.
It was her first HT, and only other as a collegian, since her three goals in the Windjammer Classic versus St. Cloud State Nov. 26, 2016.
With their sweep of the Nittany Lions that weekend, the Colonials (8-10-4, 6-1-1) slipped past Mercyhurst for first place in CHA by one point entering the semester break. Gebhard scored her conference-best 15th goal of the season at No. 2 Minnesota Dec. 7, her third straight game finding the net.
She became the sixth player in program history to score 50 career goals that night, almost a month ago to the day she became the fifth RMU player to hit the century mark in career points (Nov. 9).
Gebhard also ended the fall term comfortably ahead of the pack with her 33 points, and her 18 assists were the most in CHA as well. Entering the break, she ranked second in Division I in both goals and points, two behind national leaders Maureen Murphy (Providence) and Elizabeth Giguere (Clarkson), respectively.
Through Sunday, Gebhard remains the NCAA front-runner in power play goals (five), assists (11) and points (16), and her 305 total faceoff wins are also the most in the country.
She now sits in a fourth-place tie nationally in both goals and points, four off the pace in each category, for the idle Colonials, who resume their 2018-19 campaign Jan. 18-19 at CHA rival Syracuse.
The opening faceoffs from Tennity Ice Pavilion in Syracuse, New York are scheduled for 7:00 p.m. and 3:00 p.m. ET, respectively.
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