ITHACA, N.Y. – Freshman Kristin O’Neill scored the first and second goals of her career to help lead the women’s hockey team to a 2-1 win over Mercyhurst at Lynah Rink on Saturday afternoon. The win gave the Cornell (2-0-0) a series sweep of Mercyhurst (1-4-1) for the first time in program history.
“It’s a great start,” said head coach Doug Derraugh. “We can take that and hopefully we build off of that this upcoming week with the start of the ECAC season upon us.”
Cornell came out with energy – outshooting Mercyhurst 12 to six in the first period – and O’Neill scored just under two minutes into the game with Cornell on the man advantage.
Senior Hanna Bunton cycled the puck down to the left faceoff dot to freshman Jaime Bourbonnais, who sent a no-look backhand pass to the far post where O’Neill was camping out. O’Neill muscled off the Mercyhurst defender to tap the puck home past Jessica Convery.
After a scoreless second period – though one in which sophomore goaltender Marlène Boissonnault made eight saves, including a key pad save off of a tipped shot and – the Big Red came out ready for a tough third period.
Nearing the halfway mark of the final frame, Bunton won the puck put behind the net and allowed senior Brianna Veerman to control it. Veerman alertly found O’Neill near the hash marks and the freshman sent it past the glove of Convery.
The Lakers would pull one back when Jillian Skinner fired a shot from the point that Taylor Accursi tipped high and past Boissonnault.
The Big Red stayed controlled on defense for the remainder of the game and withstood a six-on-four for the final 1:44 of the game.
“I think moving forward we’re going to have [the same game plan] that we had coming into this weekend. A lot of energy, being relentless and being tough on the puck,” said O’Neill.
Boissonnault finished with 21 saves and Convery with 22 while Cornell finished with 24 shots to Mercyhurst’s 22.
O’Neill led the day with her two goals while Bunton had two assists and Veerman and Bourbonnais each had one.
“We got really good, consistent goaltending from both of our goalies and we got timely goals. I think with the young team, finding some ways to win is really important early on in the season,” said Derraugh.
Cornell will hit the road next weekend and open up ECAC Hockey play with a game against Rensselaer on Friday afternoon and then take on Union on Saturday.
