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Selects Roll to Third Straight win at Nationals

By Dan Bauer, Contributor, 04/03/22, 7:00AM CDT

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The Wisconsin Selects remained unbeaten at the National Tier II Tournament in Philadelphia posting an impressive 3-0 win over the Connecticut Northern Lights. Sami Federici scored a pair of goals and assisted on another and the Selects stingy defense limited Connecticut to 13 shots on goal.

Wisconsin opened the game with early pressure including a great backdoor chance by Hannah Baumann. Late in the period, with less than ten seconds to play Selects netminder Ella Sciborski made a sliding pad save to keep the game scoreless. Wisconsin out shot Connecticut 8-5 in the opening period.

The Selects scored three times in a dominating second period, starting with Federici driving home a rebound on the backdoor. Some great corner work by Addie Gruhlke got the puck to defenseman Ella Chilson and her shot was then deflected in the high slot by Gruhlke with the rebound finding Federici’s stick for a 1-0 lead. Wisconsin was relentless in the period as Federici got in alone on a breakaway and Logan Crawford earned a great rebound chance. Connecticut goalie Kaitlyn O’Brien shut down both chances. At 8:25 a pretty passing play from Hannah Baumann to Federici to Gab du Vair in the slot resulted in a 2-0 Selects lead. The Northern Lights did not record a shot on goal in the first 13 minutes of the period. Just when it looked like Connecticut would escape down only two goals, Hannah Baumann picked up a loose puck and charged up the left wing drawing two defenders to her then calmly slid the puck to Federici on the weakside as they crossed the blue line and she did the rest deking O’Brien and sliding a backhand into an open net with just 11 seconds remaining in the period.

Wisconsin held off an early push from the Northern Lights to open the third and Sciborski, with the help of a diving Dru Sabatke stopped a shorthanded breakaway late to earn the shut out and the win. Selects Head Coach Emily Bauer noted, “Ella made some big saves. Our goaltending just isn’t allowing teams to grab any momentum.” In three games the Selects have allowed only two goals. Bauer added, “We made some really nice unselfish plays on offense that led to three nice goals.”

With their 3-0 record the Selects earned the number one seed in the round robin of the National Division. They will play the Nashville Predators at 2:15 on Sunday in the quarterfinals.