Ottawa Charge Get Frosted By Minnesota In Overtime, Again
Written by: Tyler Beauchesne
After a tough 2-1 OT loss at home, the Ottawa Charge wanted to get a comeback victory in this series against the Minnesota Frost at Xcel Energy Center.
This series was tied up but the Charge wanted a bounce-back victory to gain more momentum in this series but unfortunately the odds were not in their favour in this game.
The first period had the Frost being aggressive on offense with a lot of shot opportunities. However, Gwyneth Philips did her thing as per usual and stood on her head saving shots. The defense was also blocking lots of shots to help Philips out. Later in the period, it was Emily Clark getting a beautiful tap-in opportunity off of Gabbie Hughes’ rebound with Ashton Bell getting the secondary assist to make it 1-0!
Afterwards, Brianne Jenner got a holding the stick penalty where the penalty kill unit came out and successfully killed off the Frost’s power play. The penalty kill has been a crucial part of the Charge’s success this playoff run, and this effort combined made the first period end with them holding the lead.
The second period started with the Frost tying the game with Lee Stecklein getting a hashmark shot past Philips with 17 minutes left. The Charge only had five shots so far in the game, so they had to be more aggressive with their offensive game. The Charge were able to get an opportunity on the power play later on to get the lead back. This opportunity was unsuccessful as the Charge could not get a shot off here. Their offense had been stale since Clark’s opening goal, and the period ended in a tie.
The third period started better as the Charge were playing more aggressively. They were able to get a power-play opportunity, but they were unable to score despite a better effort offensively. Jocelyne Larocque got a roughing penalty, but the Charge successfully killed that power play off well. The Charge got another power play opportunity, just for that to be killed off by the Frost. This period has mostly been a back-and-forth of special teams opportunities as both teams were getting more and more physically aggressive towards each other.
This game has been a very stressful one for both fanbases to deal with as the game stayed tied till the end of the third period meaning they were once again heading to overtime. All three games so far have not ended in regulation, proving how tight this matchup was in this series. To quote Julio Hashem, you cannot spell Ottawa without OT!
Overtime started, and both teams were fighting hard to get a lead in the series. It was a rough back-and-forth that took this game into three overtime periods. Philips could only do so much as she had stopped 44 of 46 shots, but it was Katy Knoll who got the game-winning goal against her to give the Frost a 2-1 series lead.
While the Charge’s defence and goaltending have been masterful this series, their offence has not been up to par. They have only scored four goals in three games, and they must do better at finishing and creating chances if they want to take this series to five games. I have faith that this is possible for them to do but it will be a tough task that they can hopefully overcome. Go Charge!
