MANKATO — Yeah, this team is officially hot.
No. 15 Minnesota State women’s hockey secured its fourth-straight win with a 5-0 home victory over Dartmouth Saturday. MSU improves to 10-7-1 overall.
“We’ve matured a lot over the first couple months of the season. Our leadership’s been unbelievable,” MSU head coach Shari Dickerman said. I knew they’d be great, but Taylor Otremba and Kianna Roeske have done an unbelievable job of going about their business, doing everything hard all the time and showing everybody else this is how we play Maverick hockey.”
The win caps off a four-week stretch where the Mavericks won six of eight games, including sweeps over the Big Green, Bemidji State and No. 2 Minnesota. The Mavericks’ lone losses came from a pair of road losses to No. 3 Ohio State.
“It was a good game. Great team effort,” junior Kamryn Van Batavia said. “It’s good to keep the sweeps going after (sweeping) the Gophers last week.”
Van Batavia, who finished the day with three points, netted her fifth goal of the season on the power play for a 3-0 lead with 6:48 remaining in the second.
“She does a great job moving her feet, generating offense just with her size,” Dickerman said of Van Batavia. “Sometimes she gets frustrated, and that kind of jacks up her intensity and her competitive nature. She moved her feet and got pucks to the net front.”
Junior goalie Hailey Hansen has also become red hot, turning away 90 of 94 shots across her last three games. She got the day off Saturday as freshman Kaydence Roeske had her third career start. She turned away all 21 shots for her second-straight shutout.
“She’s in a situation where she’s kind of got to sit back and wait and kind of learn from Hailey how to be kind of a professional about it,” Dickerman said of Roeske.
“She does a great job every day in practice. She’s competing, trying to learn and get better, and she’s taken (advantage of) opportunities she’s received. She’s played great for us.”
And similar to Friday’s opener the Mavericks teed off in the second period.
Lauren Goldsworthy put MSU up 1-0 5:22 into the second period. Senior captain Taylor Otremba doubled the lead five minutes later.
Freshman Mercury Bischoff, who netted six points in last weekend’s sweep over the Golden Gophers, netted team-best 10th goal of the season with 3:46 remaining in the frame. Dartmouth yanked goaltender Jiahui Zhan after Bischoff’s goal, ending her day after making 17 saves. Micheala Hesova, who started for the Big Green, stopped nine shots and surrendered the game’s final goal to Ayla Puppe with 0.8 seconds left in the game.
Bischoff finished with a goal and an assist. Lauren Zawoyski added two helpers. Lilie Ramirez and Whitney Tuttle each had an assist.
The Mavericks host No. 10 St. Cloud State at 3 p.m. Friday.