Women's Ice Hockey Set to Faceoff for the 2010-11 Season

Cornell is looking to win back-to-back Ivy League titles for the first time since 1980-81.

Poll courtesy of ECAC Hockey
Photo courtesy of Cornell Athletic Communications

PRINCETON, N.J. --  The quest to be named the 36th Ivy League women's hockey champion begins this weekend when four of the six Ivy squads open their respective 2010-11 seasons. Cornell, picked to win the ECAC Hockey title and currently ranked first in the USA TODAY/USA Hockey poll and second in the latest USCHO.com poll, will be looking to defend its 2010 Ivy League title. The Big Red most recently earned back-to-back Ivy League titles in 1980 and 1981. The last team to successfully defend the Ivy League title was Harvard, which finished atop the League standings in 2008 and 2009. The Crimson were picked to finish third in ECAC Hockey and are cuurrently 10th in the USA TODAY/USA Hockey poll and ninth in the USCHO.com rankings.      

The four Ivy League women's hockey teams that begin their 2010-11 seasons this weekend include Princeton, Cornell, Yale and Brown. The Tigers open the season with a weekend of competition against Hockey East opponents, including a Friday afternoon contest against Northeastern and a game at Providence on Saturday. The Big Red open the season by playing host to back-to-back games against Robert Morris on Friday and Saturday. Yale opens its season at Vermont on Friday, while Brown will travel north to face Boston College on Sunday afternoon. In addition, Dartmouth and Harvard will play host to McGill in exhibition action on Friday and Saturday.  The first conference games involving two Ivy League teams will occur on Oct. 29 when Brown plays at Dartmouth and Yale plays at Harvard. Both those contests are slated to begin at 7:00 p.m.

ECAC HOCKEY PLAY
The six Ivy League women's hockey teams combine with Clarkson, Colgate, Quinnipiac, Rensselaer, St. Lawrence and Union to make up the 12 teams in ECAC Hockey. Cornell was picked to finish first in ECAC Hockey, according to voting by the League coaches as part of the conference's preseason poll.

2010-11 ECAC Hockey Coaches' Preseason Poll

2009-10 RECAP
Cornell won last season's Ivy League (8-0-2) and ECAC Hockey (21-9-6 overall) titles before winning the ECAC Hockey tournament championship and making it to the NCAA Championship game. In the title game, the Big Red were oulasted in the longest game in NCAA women's ice hockey tournament history, 3-2 in triple overtime, by Minnesota-Duluth. After finishing second in the Ivy (6-2-2/20-8-5 overall), Harvard joined Cornell in the NCAA Championship field, meaning the Ivies earned two of the eight coveted spots in the NCAA Championship field. In the quarterfinals, Cornell downed Harvard, 6-2, en route to the program's first Frozen Four appearance.

Princeton posted a 5-4-1 Ivy League record last season to finish third and a 13-14-4 overall mark. Dartmouth followed in fourth with an Ivy record of 5-5-0 (12-14-2 overall). Yale (2-7-1/10-16-3 overall) and Brown (1-9-0/3-21-4 overall) finished fifth and sixth in last season's Ivy League standings.

Aside from Cornell's  2010 ECAC Hockey Tournament title, which was earned with a 4-3 overtime win against Clarkson, Harvard and Princeton also made the eight-team field and matched up against eachother in the best-of-three quarterfinal round. Seeded third, the Crimson downed sixth-seeded Princeton in two games. But Harvard's run came to an end in the semifinals when second-seeded Clarkson came away with a 3-2 win.

ALL-IVY RETURNEES
Many of last season's top performers return to take part in the 2010-11 Ivy League season, led by 2010 Ivy League Player of the year Catherine White and 2010 Ivy League Rookie of the Year Lauriane Rougeau, both of Cornell. Here is a look at the returing All-Ivy honorees from a season ago (with current class year listed):

First Team All-Ivy
F — Catherine White, Cornell (Jr., Brampton, Ont.)
F — *Kate Buesser, Harvard (Sr., Wolfeboro, N.H.)
D — *Laura Fortino, Cornell (So., Hamilton, Ont.)
D — Lauriane Rougeau, Cornell (So., Beasonsfield, Que.)
G — Amanda Mazzotta, Cornell (Jr., London, Ont.)
G — Jackee Snikeris, Yale (Sr., Downington, Pa.)

Second Team All-Ivy
F — Chelsea Karpenko, Cornell (Jr., Winnipeg, Man.)
F — Jillian Dempsey, Harvard (So., Wintrop, Mass.)
F — Bray Ketchum, Yale (Sr., Greenwich, Conn.)
D — Leanna Coskren, Harvard (Sr., Walpole, Mass.)
D — Sasha Sherry, Princeton (Sr., Lehighton, Pa.)
G — Katie Jamieson, Brown (So., Waterloo, Ont.)

Honorable Mention All-Ivy
F — Danielle DiCesare, Princeton (Jr., York, Maine)
F — Paula Romanchuk, Princeton (Jr., San Jose, Calif.)

* - Unanimous 2010 selection


HELPFUL LINKS
Ivy League Women's Hockey Team Pages
Brown
Cornell
Dartmouth
Harvard
Princeton
Yale

Additional Links
ECAC Women's Hockey
USHO.com
USCHO.com Division I women's poll
USA TODAY/USA Hockey women's poll