On Friday, Amherst faced off against defending National Champion Middlebury. The Panthers entered the game with a 5-0 record, outscoring their opponents 28-4 in the process. Combine that with the Panthers' 31-2 goal advantage over the Jeffs since 2002, and it wasn't overly surprising that the Jeffs came out on the wrong side of a 4-0 game. First-Team All-NESCAC goalie Kate Kogut was a brick wall in net for the Panthers, stopping all 19 Jeffs shots for her third shutout of the season. Kogut possesses a superhuman .967 save percentage and a 0.54 goals against average through six starts.
Emily Quizon, another First-Team All-NESCAC selection for the Panthers, scored two goals, her sixth and seventh of the season, and added an assist as well on the game-winner by Lorna Gifis.
First-year goalie Stacey Johnston did her best to keep the game at 4-0, making 34 saves in defeat.
"Actually, we played well against Middlebury which is tough to do at their [Olympic-sized] rink," said Head Coach Jim Plumer. "We were particularly pleased with our special teams-we had a game plan for their power play (which leads the country at 40.6 percent efficiency) which worked very well."
Saturday the Jeffs went up against an Eph team that appeared beatable on paper. Unfortunately for Amherst, the Ephs used the home ice to their advantage and kept the Jeffs scoreless once again to win 8-0. Eph goalie Kristin Sundet earned her first career shutout, stopping 19 shots. Gigi Stender, last week's NESCAC Player of the Week, scored two goals for the Ephs, including the game-winner on the power play at 4:56 in the first period. Sarah Nowakowski and Ashley Wood scored two goals apiece for the Ephs as well.
The Jeffs were once again outshot by an extremely large margin, 45-19. Johnston and Lindsay Grabowski '07 split time in net, with Johnston playing the first 16:34 and the final half of the third period and Grabowski playing the middle 33:26. Johnston allowed all three goals in the first period and Grabowski allowed five goals (three on breakaways) during her time between the pipes.
"In order for us to play against the top teams, we have to be focused and play hard and play smart. As a young team we are still learning to do that on a consistent basis," said Plumer. "We are all committed to working towards learning what we need to from this past weekend and using it as motivation for improvements over the rest of the season."
The Jeffs will finish the semester with an afternoon home game against non-conference opponent Utica College on Dec. 12. Then Amherst will have three weeks off before playing host to NESCAC powerhouse Bowdoin College on Jan. 7.