EAU CLAIRE, Wis. (Blugolds.com) – The UW-Eau Claire women's hockey team struggled to protect the power play and paid for it as it came up short, losing to fellow NCHA conference team Adrian College 4-1.

Things started slow in the first period for both teams with not much action going on.  It was not until half way through the first period that Adrian went on its offensive attack.  It was 11:40, when the Bulldogs scored their first goal of the night.  The Bulldogs came back again at 14:37 with a power play goal seconds after Allison Malecek  (Jr.- Maple Plain, Minn./Delano) was given a two minute minor penalty for tripping.  Adrian would go on to score another goal at 16:56 to put the Bulldogs ahead 3-0 over the Blugolds. 

In the second period, Adrian was again able to take advantage of the power play opportunity and scored a goal in the last minute of the period.  The Blugolds were down a player after Sam Knutson (Fr.-North St. Paul, Minn./North St. Paul)  was called two minutes for tripping. 

The third period got a little chaotic with both teams combining for a total of 7 penalties which was one more than they had total in their Friday night matchup.  Casey McMullen (Jr.-Minneapolis, Minn./South)was able to get one goal in for the Blugolds and help them avoid the shutout.  She had an unassisted goal at 17:14 to bring the score to 4-1 in favor of Adrian. 

The Blugolds did outshoot the Bulldogs 32-20, but they just were not able to get past Adrian goaltender Brittany Zeches as she had 31 saves on the night.   Another deciding factor of the game was that Adrian took advantage of the power play opportunities as they were 2-4 whereas the Blugolds were 0-5 on the night.  Morgan Pieper (Sr.-Williams, Minn./Warroad) 16 saves on the night. 

The Blugolds will head to Stevens Point, Wis., next weekend to take on the Pointers.  The matchup will start at 7 p.m. Friday night.  

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