Buffs lose to defending ACHA national champion Midland
The Colorado Buffaloes women’s hockey team took their first loss on Sunday to the defending national champions, Midland Warriors, 3-1.
The Buffs finished the opening weekend 2-1. Colorado didn’t expect to win, but learned something from playing a national-champion-caliber team.
“I look at it as an opportunity to see what a really good team looks like,” head coach David Tenzer said on Friday. “Watch how these teams play and learn from it.”
Midland ultimately dominated Colorado. Shots on goal ended in favor of the Warriors, 52-11. MU had the puck on their stick for the vast majority of the game. Still, the Buffs only lost 3-1. That score is impressive considering the Colorado State Rams lost 12-0 and 14-0 to Midland the two days prior.
Buffs’ goaltender Shira Wein had one of the best games of her career. She set a new career-high with 49 saves. Midland’s high-flying offense was held to two even-strength goals and didn’t score in the third period.
Wein didn’t allow rebounds and was only beaten once by a brilliant top-corner shot. It was the only success the Warriors had going to Wein’s glove-side.
Credit also goes to the Buffs on defense, who stopped countless shots from getting to the net. Sophomore defenseman Izzy Mitchell was a standout shot blocker. CU crowded the slot and got sticks to shots from the circles. Two of Midland’s goals came on defensive breakdowns where a forward went unguarded by the left post.
Colorado’s power play was really bad in its first two tries. The Buffs lost face-offs, missed breakout passes and were outskated. They coughed up a shorthanded breakaway each time, Wein bailing both out. Neither power play unit could get the puck deep in the offensive zone.
The Buffs' third power play chance late in the second period started a lot like the first two. The Warriors were given another breakaway, and the first minute of the man-advantage was spent in the Buffs’ zone. With 90 seconds left in the period, the Buffs got the puck back after a muffed clear attempt by Warriors defenseman Makenna Larson.
The shorthanded Warriors found themselves out of position, and Abby Piatigorsky found senior forward Natalie Ewald crashing in the slot alone. A one-time shot from Ewald put the Buffs on the board to make it 3-1; Ewald’s first goal of the year.
At even strength, the first line left a lot to be desired. The top forwards were uncharacteristically poor at connecting passes, and could never break out through the neutral zone. Mia Fiscelli had one shot on goal. Midland was smothering on zone entries, and Colorado got nothing skating the puck across the blue line.
However, the Buffs kept it relatively close. Despite the domination from Midland, at no point did it feel like they were running away with the game. CU played a full 60 minutes and never stopped going hard on the forecheck or putting their bodies in the way of shots. There’s optimism for the Buffs moving forward in conference play, where the competition will be much easier.
That will be put to the test on the road next weekend, where Colorado will play the Grand Canyon Antelopes twice and the Arizona State Sun Devils, two schools that made nationals last season. Revenge will be on the mind of the Buffs against GCU, who won the WWCHL championship in double overtime in Boulder last February. The three-game series begins Friday, Oct. 2, at 8 p.m. MT.
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