Victoire Shut Out Frost to Move Up the PWHL Standings
Courtesy of the PWHL
It was a battle of heavy weights as the Minnesota Frost returned home to host the Montreal Victoire. The Frost came into this matchup with five straight wins and had outscored their opponents 19-7 in that span. The Victoire, on the other hand, had lost two of their last four games, with their most recent contest being a 2-1 overtime loss to the Ottawa Charge, and sit just two points behind the Frost in the standings. With three crucial points on the line, this was destined to be a great contest.
The first period passed by scoreless as neither team found the back of the net. Ann-Renee Desbiens stopped all six shots Minnesota put on net and Maddie Rooney stopped all five shots that Montreal generated. The Victoire got the only power play opportunity of the period as Abby Hustler sat for two minutes due to an illegal body checking penalty, but they weren’t able to capitalize on it.
Montreal came out strong to start the middle frame. Through the first seven minutes, the Victoire outshot the Frost 5-2 and were maintaining offensive zone pressure which allowed them to generate plenty of scoring chances. Also, to no one’s surprise, this game was quite physical as hits were being laid by both teams at every possible chance. All of that offensive zone time finally paid off in the final minute of the second period as Catherine Dubois scored her second of the season to get the Victoire out to a 1-0 lead heading into the second intermission.
The Victoire kept building on that momentum in the third. Hayley Scamurra scored her third goal of the season just over five minutes into the final frame to give Montreal the 2-0 lead. The scoring wasn’t done just yet. The Frost had a bad line change and the Victoire capitalized on the mistake as Kati Tabin passed to Lina Ljungblom who exploded up the ice to get the puck past Rooney to make the score 3-0. Minnesota attempted to get at least one goal on the board, but Montreal hung on to win the game and Desbiens secured her fifth shutout of the season.
Although Desbiens earned the first star of the game and stopped all 21 shots faced, she credited the team that played in front of her for the win. "It was a really big team effort from every single player out there. I thought we kept working hard. And when you wear a team down after two, three periods, sometimes it takes a little longer to get rewarded with goals. But obviously Dubois had a nice shot on that goal. Lina [Ljungblom], Hayley Scamurra, all [players] that always work so hard, so it was nice to see them rewarded with goals tonight. And obviously that gave us a lot of confidence. We did such a good job defensively at taking their time and space away, being physical when we needed it, and taking their opportunities."
The Victoire are back in action on Saturday, March 28 as they take on the New York Sirens at Little Caesars Arena in Detroit for the PWHL Takeover Tour. Puck drop is scheduled for 1 PM EDT. The Frost’s next game is on Sunday, March 29 when they welcome the Boston Fleet to Grand Casino Arena in St. Paul. Puck drop for that game is scheduled for 4 PM EDT.