ERIE, Pa. - The Robert Morris University women's hockey team earned a point on the road Friday evening, playing to a 2-2 tie at Mercyhurst Ice Center.
Emilie Harley scored her first of the year and Lexi Templeman potted her 30th career goal for the Colonials in the effort.
While Mercyhurst enjoyed a significant share of zone time in the opening frame, the Colonials managed to earn some quality looks of their own on the counter.
Marah Wagner nearly potted her third of the season on a point black chance from the slot, but she was denied with a quick save from Jenna Silvonen.
After surviving a Lakers push thanks to a few huge stops from Raygan Kirk, the Colonial power-play struck gold. Emilie Harley's first of the season from the lower right circle gave the Colonials a 1-0 lead, the first PP goal allowed by Mercyhurst all season.
More timely goaltending from Kirk helped persevere the RMU lead after 20 minutes of action.
A fortunate bounce helped double the Colonails' lead less than a minute into the second frame when Lexi Templeman's wrister from the high slot deflected off of traffic in the crease, bouncing up over the head and behind Silvonen and into the back of the net.
Kirk continued her stellar play at the other end, turning aside a flurry of shots including one on a deflection by Jersey Phillips in tight, however a determined Lakers squad that had been pressing hard finally broke through to cut the Colonial lead in half midway through the second.
After a turnover at the RMU blue line, Megan Korzack collected the loose puck on a breakaway before cutting into the slot on Kirk and sliding it five-hole to breakup the shutout bid.
Despite a late penalty on Marah Wagner, RMU escaped the middle frame up a goal.
Still holding on to their 2-1 lead midway through the final frame, Robert Morris endured a final push from the Lakers who finally managed to even things up when Alexa Vasko got a piece of a shot on its way to Kirk that deflected over the goaltender's shoulder and in.
The momentum shifted to Mercyhurst even more moments later when Wasyn Rice was given five and a game for head contact, putting RMU down a skater for the final 1:20 of regulation and over three minutes of overtime.
After some excellent PK work to get it into the final frame, the senior trio of Harley, Templeman, and Emily Curlett went to work in OT, earning several big clears and preventing Mercyhurst from getting good looks on Kirk.
The play of Harley in particular was immense, as the senior did not get off the ice for over three full minutes of OT until the penalty had been killed and extra time restored to three-on-three.
Despite a few quick rushes at the end including a glorious chance from Joelle Fiala, neither team could find a third goal before time ran out and both teams skated away with a point.
SCORING PLAYS
Harley, 10:41, 1st (PP) - Assists: Templeman, Boyle
Templeman, 0:39, 2nd - Unassisted
Korzack, 8:55, 2nd - Unassisted
Vasko, 16:49, 3rd - Assists: Marmen, Weiss
QUICK HITS
Second straight regular season tie between RMU and Mercyhurst…Lexi Templeman scored her 30th career goal…Harley scored her first of the season…Kirk made 34 saves in goal…Colonials scored the first power-play goal allowed by Mercyhurst all season and went 1-3 on the night
QUOTABLES
"You've just got to stick with it, stay confident and trust the process because I thought we generated a lot of good scoring opportunities tonight. We fought hard and had a few chances to win it on the road when we were down a player which was exciting, and then we had a huge kill going into overtime which I thought was a great gut check and showed a lot of determination." - Head Coach Paul Colontino
UP NEXT
RMU closes out the home-and-home with the Lakers when they host Mercyhurst tomorrow at 2 p.m. at Clearview Arena.
