NEVILLE TWP., Pa. — Maggy Burbidge, Lexi Templeman and Emily Curlett registered a goal each in the second period as Robert Morris defeated RIT 5-1 at the RMU Island Sports Center on Friday night.
The Colonials opened the contest with an early goal by Joelle Fiala, as the first-year found a puck that rolled into the crease and deposited it into the cage. Robert Morris couldn’t maintain the momentum, and several lapses led to a late Tigers goal by Hunter Barnett that tied the contest heading into the first intermission.
It was a breakaway goal by Burbidge at 6:19 of the second that broke the ice for Robert Morris, as the Colonials followed up a minute later with a goal from Templeman, and then a point shot from Curlett that bounced off of RIT netminder Terra Lanteigne and rolled across the goal line. Junior Anjelica Diffendal scored an apparent goal late in the frame that was overturned on a subsequent review by the officials.
“It was huge,” Paul Colontino said. “We thought our players, our team responded well. We thought our first period was okay, thought we made a lot of mental errors, and we came out and killed off the penalty. I thought the shifts that we got were completely game changing and that we built some great momentum off of some excellent goals that were created by fundamentally sound hockey.”
Senior Natalie Marcuzzi capped the scoring with a highlight-reel shorthanded breakaway goal at 7:45 of the final period for her fifth of the campaign.
The Tigers pushed back in the third, but Colonials netminder Raygan Kirk stood tall, stopping all twelve shots she faced in the stanza.
Kirk finished the game with 29 saves for her twelfth victory on the season, while Lanteigne fell to 8-11-3 while registering 36 stops on the day.
SPREAD THE WEALTH
Ten different Robert Morris skaters registered points on the evening with Jaycee Gebhard and Leah Marino adding two assists a piece. Gebhard, the Colonials all time leading scorer, moved within nine points of the 200-point plateau.
SENIOR SATURDAY
Robert Morris closes out the home portion of their schedule and the season series with RIT on Saturday at 3:05 p.m. at the Island Sports Center. Gebhard, Marcuzzi and Sarah Lecavalier will be honored in a pre-game ceremony prior to their final home game.
Gebhard and Marcuzzi started their careers with Robert Morris as part of their 2017 College Hockey America championship squad. Lecavalier joined the squad the following season as an offseason transfer from now-defunct North Dakota.
