No.7 UMD Women’s Hockey “staying in the moment” ahead of WCHA playoffs this weekend

DULUTH, MN. (Northern News Now) - The quest for the cup for the No.7 UMD Women’s Hockey team begins this Friday, February 24 as they open up the first round of WCHA playoffs on home ice.

The Bulldogs will open up league postseason play with No.12 St. Cloud State who they saw just a few weeks ago. While UMD wasn’t able to bury the puck a lot, scoring just three goals in that series, they did have the puck the majority of the time outshooting the Huskies 76-36.

After UMD’s 11-1 scoring run last weekend against Bemidji State, the Bulldogs offense is rolling, but they continue to bring forth their “stay in the moment” mentality as Gabbie Hughes and the Bulldogs start trophy chasing in her last post-season run. The captain says the pressure and passion are at an all-time high, but that is what makes playoffs so fun and so special.

“I’m so excited! I think our team is starting to get our offense going at the right time. I think our lines are doing really well right now and last weekend it was huge for us to get that confidence going and for my class personally we’re hungry. We came in as freshmen not having a sniff at a National Championship so to continue to try and build that every single year, we have that drive and I think we’re all super excited and know what we’re capable of and we’re ready to show it,” said Hughes.

“The series last weekend is where we got our offense cracking and the power play was phenomenal and the PK was phenomenal, so I think a lot of things are working well so our focus is on game one and that first shift and going from there,” added Crowell.

The Bulldogs drop the puck for the best of three series on Friday at 3 pm at AMSOIL.

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