Halkes Stands Tall as Maine Win Shootout, Casucci Does It Again for UNH, Lowell Take the Title
Thursday settled the America East regular season, and it took a shootout, an overtime winner and a shutout to do it. Three games, three very different kinds of drama, and a tournament bracket that is now set.
Maine’s day was the loudest. The Black Bears beat Vermont 2-1 in a shootout on Senior Day in Orono, and they did it the hard way. Vermont outshot them 23-4 and had the better of the game from the first quarter, when freshman goalkeeper Annabel Halkes made four saves just to keep it scoreless. Martha Barratt put Maine ahead from a penalty corner at 17:09, with Saylor Kuefler and Eloise Penty assisting, and Maine led 1-0 at half-time against the run of play.
Vermont levelled from a penalty corner at 36:23, and from there it was Halkes against the Catamounts. She made one more save to send it to overtime, then three more in the extra period while Vermont outshot Maine 6-0. In the shootout, Floor Dijkhuizen, Emily Chisholm and Taylor Stanford all converted before Halkes stopped Vermont’s final attempt, and Penty scored the decider for a 4-3 shootout win. Ten saves for a freshman, on Senior Day, in a game her team was second best in for long stretches. That is a performance that travels into the tournament.
Maine finish 3-2 in conference play and take the number two seed. They host the winner of Sunday’s quarter-final between third-seeded UAlbany and sixth-seeded Bryant on Tuesday.
At Bryant, it was a freshman again. Julianna Casucci scored both goals as New Hampshire won 2-1 in overtime. Callie Caito gave Bryant the lead in the 16th minute, and it held until the final minute of regulation, when Casucci deflected Becky Ward’s entry pass high inside the left post at 59:06, with 54 seconds left. In overtime, Casucci turned in the circle with her back to goal and finished low inside the right post at 66:47. It was her second overtime winner of the season. She also scored the overtime winner at Maine.
UNH end the regular season 5-10 overall and 3-2 in the conference, in a three-way tie for second, and take the fourth seed on the tiebreaker. They host Vermont in a quarter-final on Sunday at 12pm. Bryant finish 7-10 and 0-5 in the conference, and go in as the sixth seed at UAlbany.
The title game was the quietest of the three, and the most decisive. UMass Lowell beat UAlbany 2-0 in Albany, with the regular-season championship on the line. UAlbany started brightly and outshot the River Hawks 11-8, but Lowell scored with less than a minute left in the third quarter, then added a second five minutes into the fourth, and that was that. UAlbany had two more penalty corners and two more shots and could not break through.
Lowell finish 10-7 overall and 4-1 in the conference, champions of the regular season. UAlbany finish 9-6 and 3-2, third seeds, and they host Bryant on Sunday. The scorers in Albany were not named in the host report, and this piece does not guess at them.
Sunday sorts the rest. UNH against Vermont in Durham, UAlbany against Bryant in Albany, and the winners go to Maine and to Lowell. After Thursday, nobody will fancy facing a freshman goalkeeper in form, or a freshman forward who keeps winning games in overtime.
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