Women's Hockey Drops Puck on 2009-10 Season at Cornell and Colgate

Fri, Dartmouth (0-0-0, 0-0-0 ECAC) at Cornell (0-2-0, 0-0-0 ECAC), 3 p.m.
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Sat. Dartmouth (0-0-0, 0-0-0 ECAC) at Colgate (1-5-0, 0-0-0 ECAC), 3:30 p.m.
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HANOVER, N.H. - The Dartmouth women's hockey team is set to open the 2009-10 season with a tough road trip to start the year at Cornell and Colgate.

Dartmouth faces Cornell on Friday afternoon at 3:00 p.m. and will travel to Colgate for a Halloween matchup at 3:30 p.m.

LET'S GET STARTED
The Dartmouth women's hockey team is set to begin its 33rd varsity season and seventh under head coach Mark Hudak. The Big Green is coming off a championship season as Dartmouth won the 2009 ECAC Hockey Tournament, winning its fourth tournament and made its eighth NCAA Tournament. The Big Green returns 15 letterwinners and lost one of its most experienced classes with seven skaters graduating. The team has also added seven newcomers to the mix and Dartmouth will have another large squad as the team will feature 22 skaters. The Big Green will feature seniors Jenna Cunningham and Sarah Parsons as co-captains for the 2009-10 season.

PRESEASON POLLS
Dartmouth was picked to finish third overall according to the ECAC Hockey Preseason Coaches Poll. The Big Green earned 93 points in the poll and also received five first-place votes, which was the most of any team. St. Lawrence was picked to win the league with 107 points, while Harvard came in at 103 points.

PRESEASON ALL-LEAGUE
Senior co-captain Jenna Cunningham was the lone Big Green selection to make the ECAC Hockey Preseason All-League team. She amassed 35 points last season for second on the team and it is the first time she has been chosen as a top player prior to a season.

NATIONAL POLLS
Dartmouth has jumped around the national polls so far this season without playing a game. In the first USCHO.com poll, the Big Green was eighth and jumped to seventh after the first week. Since then Dartmouth went back to eighth and in the most recent poll the Big Green is at its highest point at No. 6. Minnesota and Mercyhurst have been steady at No. 1 and 2 all season as both team have yet to lose a game. Wisconsin, last year's national champion, has seen a drop off this season as the Badgers fell to eighth after starting as a top team.

REPLACING EXPERIENCE
This season the Big Green will be replacing one of its most experienced classes ever to graduate from Dartmouth. The class of 2009 won two ECAC Hockey Tournament titles, one regular-season title and an Ivy League championship. The seven members also made three-straight NCAA Tournament appearances in their final three seasons. The group included two-time All-Ivy performer in Sarah Newnam, former ECAC Hockey Goaltender of the Year Carli Clemis and 100-point scorers Maggie Kennedy and Shannon Bowman, as well as Marley McMillan, Julia Bronson and Katie Gray.

OPENING NIGHT SUCCESS
Under head coach Mark Hudak, the Big Green has had great success in season openers as Dartmouth has posted a 5-1 record in kickoffs. Last season Dartmouth opened up at Princeton and came away with a 3-2 win. The Big Green actually began the season with five-straight wins. The lone loss came in 2006-07 when Dartmouth opened up at Mercyhurst and actually dropped its first two contests.

UPCOMING MILESTONES
The Big Green have two skaters rewriting the record books as seniors Sarah Parsons and Jenna Cunningham enter their final seasons. Parson has already reached the 100-point mark, but is looking to rise up the rankings of the best players to play in Hanover. Cunningham is four points away from 100 with 96 and she has had a hard road, missing half of the 2007-08 season. In that season she appeared in just 17 games, but exploded for 37 points.

SENIOR LEADERSHIP
Seniors Jenna Cunningham and Sarah Parsons were chosen by their teammates to be the leaders during the 2009-10 season. It will be the 21st time that the Big Green has selected two members to be captains. Dartmouth has also selected three captains five times in its history.

SEVEN NEWCOMERS
For the second year in a row, the Dartmouth women's hockey program has welcomed seven new faces to its history. The Big Green recruited heavily north of the border as five of the seven are here from Canada, while the last two were mentioned as top players in the state of Minnesota. Ontario is well represented with four skaters: Margaux Sharp (Carleton Place, Ont.), Jessica Gagner (London, Ont.), Sasha Nanji (Markham, Ont.) and Whitney Woodcox (Oshawa, Ont.). Camille Dumais is the lone Canadian not from Ontario as she is from Quebec. Sally Komarek travels east from Minneapolis and was a finalist for Miss Minnesota Hockey, while Lisa Berreman was also up for the award and she is from Eagan, Minn.

SCOUTING THE BIG RED
Cornell has been fortunate as the Big Red has played two games, while Dartmouth has yet to play this season. However, the two games were against top-ranked Mercyhurst. Cornell lost back-to-back games at home to the Lakers, both by the score of 4-1.

The Big Red was led by Karlee Overguard and Chelsea Karpenko in the two losses and each tallied goals over the weekend. Cornell has a big name missing this season as former ECAC Rookie of the Year, Rebecca Johnston is currently training on Team Canada for the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver. She leaves 45 points a season ago, but the team's second leading scorer, sophomore Catherine White is back with her 44 points from last season. She posted one assist in the weekend losses.

On the blueline, the Big Red is young as Cornell has three sophomores and two freshmen with a pair seniors that play both defense and forward. The two newcomers got the start over the weekend, Laura Fortino and Lauriane Rougeau.

In net, sophomore Amanda Mazzotta takes over as the primary netminder after spending last season as the third-string goaltender. She made 38 saves in the two games against Mercyhurst and gave up seven goals. Junior Kate Wilson is the backup for Cornell and she didn't she the ice last season.

SERIES HISTORY
This is the 66th meeting between Cornell and Dartmouth, with the Big Green owning a 39-20-6 advantage in the 30-year history of this Ivy League rivalry. The teams first met back in February of 1979 with the Big Red skating to a lopsided 8-1 win. Dartmouth has been unbeaten in the last 20 games with a 19-0-1 record during that stretch. Last season was the first time Dartmouth didn't come out on top as the team's played to a 3-3 tie. The Big Green last lost to Cornell on Jan. 24, 1999 in a 4-3 loss in Ithaca.

SCOUTING THE RAIDERS
Colgate has come out of the gate sluggish with just one win in its first six games. The Raiders have had a tough schedule so far as five of the six games have come against teams that were ranked at some point a season ago. The lone win came at Connecticut on Oct. 17 with a 5-2 defeat of the Huskies. Colgate started the season against Hockey East foes, New Hampshire and Boston College, falling in both by a combined score of 8-3.

Senior Katie Stewart and junior Jessi Waters currently lead the team in points with four apiece. Stewart has a goal and three assists, while Waters is tops in assists with four. Freshman Brittany Phillips leads the team in goals with two, including a power play score and a game-winner. The Raiders have spread out their scoring with 14 players with at least one point.

Waters is also listed as a defensive player, along with senior Ali Edell. After those two, Colgate is young with three freshmen and two sophomores on its blueline. Three of the five already have goals and each has seen ice time in each game this year.

In net, junior Lisa Plenderleith and sophomore Kimberly Sass are sharing time as each has started three games this year. Plenderleith has stuggleed with an 0-3 mark, but leads with a 3.00 goals against average. Sass has the lone win, but has posted a 3.38 goals against average in her three games. The two are even with 87 saves and in goals against, Plenderleith has given up nine, while Sass has let 10 reach the back of the net.

SERIES HISTORY
These two schools have developed a fierce rivalry over the past few seasons. Colgate and Dartmouth are meeting for the 31st time since 1979, but the two have met eight times in the past two seasons. Last season the teams faced off five times with the Big Green coming away with a slim 3-2 advantage. Dartmouth has eliminated the Raiders five times in the first round of the ECAC Hockey Tournament five times and twice in the past two years. The Big Green have a 25-4-1 advantage in the series, but Colgate has come on lately with its two wins a season ago.

Schedules