No. 7 Ohio State came into today’s rematch with No. 1 Wisconsin looking for a series sweep after toppling the Badgers on Friday. The Buckeyes had to settle for a split. The angry Badgers roared back with a crushing attack and the Bucks struggled to execute the way they did in last night’s win.
| Scoring by Period | 1 | 2 | 3 | Final |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| No. 1 Wisconsin | 2 | 1 | 2 | 5 |
| No. 7 Ohio State | 1 | 1 | 0 | 2 |
The Badgers grabbed an early edge 52 seconds into the game. Emma Maltais drew the Buckeyes even near the midpoint of the period with an extra attacker goal. But power play goals late in the first and early in the second periods extended Wisconsin’s lead to 3-1.
| Buckeye Goal Scorers (Assists) | Pd | Time |
|---|---|---|
| EA - Emma Maltais (Charly Dahlquist) | 1 | 10:40 |
| PP - Sophie Jaques (Jincy Dunne, Liz Schepers) | 2 | 19:34 |
The middle period was a particularly rough one for the Scarlet and Gray. The Badgers outshot them, 17-1. Ohio State didn’t register an official shot on goal until the final seconds of the frame.
But the Bucks made that shot count. Sophie Jaques struck on the power play to cut Wisconsin’s lead to a single goal. In spite of being outshot 33-8 over the first two periods, Ohio State trailed by a narrow 3-2 margin going into the third.
Unfortunately the Buckeyes weren’t able to close the gap. Wisconsin pulled away with a pair of goals midway through the final frame. Nadine Muzerall summed up her team’s performance following the game.
“Defensively we were giving up opportunities that we didn’t yesterday,” said the Buckeye coach. “Our PK rotation and our power play weren’t being executed. Unfortunately we were thin in all areas of the ice. We just made some really bad errors and those are the errors you cannot make against a great team because they’re going to take the opportunity.”
The loss drops Ohio State to 15-7-0 overall and 9-5-0-0 in the WCHA. The Bucks fall back into third place in the conference, still only three short points behind Wisconsin. They maintain a .500 or better record against every WCHA foe save Bemidji State.
OSU is on the road next week to face fourth place Minnesota-Duluth. Friday’s game is set to begin at 8pm ET. Saturday’s gets underway at 5pm ET. Both games can be streamed live with a subscription to FloHockey.
- Wisconsin outshot Ohio State 44-14 in the game. Maddy Field (3) led all Buckeye shooters.
- The Bucks were 1-for-3 on the power play today and 4-for-6 on the penalty kill.
