Do or Die in Durham

The Harvard women's hockey team is peaking as it heads to Durham, NH, for tomorrow's 7 p.m. playoff game against New Hampshire, but it may need its best performance of the year to upset the Wildcats.

UNH (27-4-3, 18-1-3 ECAC) is not only the top seed in the ECAC playoffs, it has held the No. 1 ranking in the American Hockey Magazine Women's College Hockey Poll for ten weeks. Senior co-captain Brandy Fisher is one of 11 finalists for the first Patty Kazmaier Memorial Award for the most outstanding player in women's college hockey.

The Wildcats boast the nation's highest scoring offense, averaging 5.84 goals per game, and they are second nationally in defense, allowing just 1.68 goals per game.

New Hampshire clinched an automatic berth in the first American Women's College Hockey Alliance Division I National Ice Hockey Championship by winning the ECAC regular season title

But Harvard (14-15, 8-14 ECAC), playing its first playoff game since 1995, still has a chance to participate in the sport's first national tournament.

"Not many of us have been in the playoffs, but everyone keeps saying that anything can happen," sophomore forward Sally Maloney said.

Three other teams will go to the national tournament. If the Wildcats lose the ECAC tournament, then the ECAC champion will join UNH and two wild-cards. The remaining eligible teams would be the six other ECAC playoff contenders along with Minnesota, the only Division I school outside the ECAC.

The Crimson can make the tournament by winning the ECAC championship or by impressing the wildcard voters with a strong playoff performance. Both national semifinals will be at Harvard's Bright Hockey Center on March 20, and the championship game will be the following day at the FleetCenter in Boston.

That means Harvard must advance in the ECAC playoffs. Advancing will not be easy, especially against No. 1 New Hampshire, who has beaten the Crimson twice this year, 6-3 in Durham and 7-1 at the Bright Center. However, Harvard is confident that it is playing its best hockey of the year.

"If we play the way we did last weekend, then we can give them a pretty good fight," junior forward Elizabeth Ganzenmuller said. "The goals will come, but we need to play tough, hard defense to stop them from scoring, and our defense has gotten a lot stronger."

The defense could not have been much better last week. The Crimson's excellent forechecking kept the puck in the offensive zone, allowing Harvard to reel off 59 shots on goal while limiting the Elis and the Tigers to a total of 25 shots. Sophomore goaltender Crystal Springer made 24 saves and let the puck through the pipes only once, earning her ECAC goalie of the week honors.

The Crimson is winning awards and setting records by the handful. Freshman forward Kiirsten Suurkask was named Ivy League Rookie of the Year this week. Her two goals last weekend gave her a total of 51 points for the season, moving her into a tie with Tammy Shewchuk '01 and A.J. Mleczko '99 for third place on Harvard's single-season scoring list. Freshman forward Angie Francisco is first on that list with 57 points, and her three assists against Princeton and Yale gave her a total of 36 for the year, adding to her single-season assist record.

Harvard will only lose two players next year, goalie Jen Bowdoin and forward Kate Schutt. That means Springer, Suurkask, Francisco, and the rest of the Crimson squad will be back, along with the return of Shewchuk and Mleczko, who left school for a year to participate in the Winter Olympics.

With such a bright future, this year's playoffs will be a learning experience for the young team.

"Playoff experience is really important," Coach Katey Stone said. "When you know you are going to get back a few more weapons next year and hope to make the playoffs, your younger kids will not be so star-struck by the whole thing. They will be able to handle it with a lot of confidence."

Harvard expects to return to the post-season in the future, but this is the last chance for Fisher, the Wildcat star who leads the nation in scoring with 40 goals and 37 assists for the season. This will be her only chance to win the new national tournament, and Harvard is hoping she will be overanxious.

"We have no pressure on us, and UNH is expected to win," Stone said. "When you are expected to do things, sometimes it does not always work out that way."

But Fisher, who had 12 points in three games last week and was named ECAC player of the week, is not the entire team. Junior forward Melissa Heitzman had a hat trick and two assists in a 14-3 victory over Colby to raise her total to 55 points for the season. Sophomore forward Samantha Holmes had four points to lead UNH past St. Lawrence, 11-0, giving her 41 points for the year. New Hampshire outscored their opponents last weekend 29-7.

But the Wildcats closed out the regular season by tying No. 4 Cornell, 4-4, last Sunday. Harvard defeated the Big Red, 5-2, in Ithaca earlier this year. The Crimson also only gave up one goal last weekend, and it will have to continue to play good defense to compete with UNH.

"They have a lot of depth and a much longer bench than we do," Stone said. "But if we can have a good showing goal-tending-wise and keep ourselves close, anything can happen. I am really looking forward to it and I think our kids are well prepared."