Wisconsin women's hockey primed for top-five showdown with Minnesota after sweep of Bemidji State
The Wisconsin women’s hockey team enters its most critical stretch of the regular season fresh off back-to-back shutouts that extended its winning streak to a season-best 13 games.
The second-ranked Badgers swept Bemidji State, scoring a 10-0 victory Friday night and winning, 7-0, Saturday.
Next up: No. 5 Minnesota on Friday and Saturday at La Bahn Arena followed by a visit from No. 1 Ohio State in the final series of the regular season.
Wisconsin (26-4, 20-4 WCHA) is in second place In the WCHA and faces the Gophers at 7 p.m. Friday and 2 p.m. Saturday.
Barring an upset, Ohio State will clinch the conference title this week against last place St. Thomas. Nonetheless, the stretch provides the Badgers a chance to enter the postseason on a high note.
"Our team has been waiting for these last two weekends coming up, especially getting to be in front of our home crowd,” Kirsten Simms said. “It'll be huge, it'll get our adrenaline going and we're definitely ready to go."
Simms and fellow sophomore Laila Edwards recorded hat tricks Friday with Edwards finishing with a career-high four points. Senior Casey O’Brien recorded her 100th career assist in that game and during the series surpassed the 50-point plateau for the first time since her sophomore season.
On Saturday four goals in the final period turned a much closer contest into another lopsided win.
Simms (one goal, three assists) had seven points in the series. O’Brien, who scored twice and recorded an assist Saturday, finished the weekend with six points. So did Edwards, who had two assists in the finale.
For the series, 10 Badgers scored at least one goal. Fifteen skaters posted at least one point.
“I think when we get into the playoffs and later games like Minnesota and Ohio coming up, it’s important to be producing from all three lines,” O’Brien said. “We kind of have this next man up mentality and when one person or one line isn’t scoring, it’s up to the next one, and we’ve done a really good job at that.”
This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Wisconsin women's hockey sweeps Bemidji State; No. 5 Minnesota up next
