By COURTNEY LEWIS
PLATTSBURGH — Two turnovers. Two flicks of the wrists. One clang off the crossbar.
Game over. Season over.
Plattsburgh State was less than two minutes away from the final four until Sophie Leclerc tallied two unassisted goals in a stunning turnaround that left Leclerc shaking, Norwich coach Mark Bolding at a loss for words and the Cardinals devastated.
Leclerc, Norwich's senior captain, finished with three points Saturday in the Cadets' 3-2 upset in an NCAA Division III Women's Ice Hockey Championship first-round game at Stafford Ice Arena.
"I'm almost speechless to see us come back and pull it off," Bolding said. "They're certainly the best opponent I've ever seen, and somehow we found a way to do it.
"It was a tremendous momentum swing, and our captain did the job."
For a few minutes it looked like two Plattsburgh State freshmen would be the heroes. Teal Gove put the Cardinals ahead with just under six minutes left, and Shannon Flattery scored her second career goal in the first period.
Plattsburgh State doubled Norwich in shots in the first, but then the Cardinals couldn't get into the offensive zone as much as they wanted. The Cadets outshot them the rest of the way.
Plattsburgh State senior Stephanie Moberg said the Cadets "came out and wanted it more, and the scoreboard at the end of the game shows that. They played 60 minutes of hockey and hard — wanted it every second. And we lacked that."
The third-ranked Cardinals lost two games in seven days after dropping just one the whole regular season.
They went into the playoffs on an 18-game unbeaten streak. But they didn't bring their best game in last week's conference tournament or Saturday's contest and were left trying to figure out what happened.
"I'd love to tell you if I knew," Moberg said.
This is their second straight first-round exit.
The 10th-ranked Cadets (19-5-5) will play Elmira in the semifinals in St. Peter, Minn. Friday, and Amherst will meet Gustavus Adolphus.
Gove gave Plattsburgh State its short-lived 2-1 lead 14:08 into the third by stuffing the puck in the lower left side. The Cardinals committed a penalty shortly afterward and successfully killed it.
Then Leclerc jumped on a turnover, walked in from the left and beat Mandy Mackrell blocker side with 1:37 to go. The Barre, Vt. native buried the go-ahead on a similar play but from the other side of the ice and with the puck going in high and glove side. The clock read 0:42.
"Honestly, after it was all said and done, I was shaking a little bit," Leclerc said. "I don't really know. It was just one of those things where it's almost like my career was flashing before my eyes, I guess you could say.
"And it was a little desperation, a little luck. I guess you can call it anything you want. It went in."
Plattsburgh State pulled Mackrell and had one great chance to tie it. Megan DiJulio fired a shot from near the left circle that smacked the crossbar — and made Leclerc's heart skip beats.
"Yeah, I think it skipped like 10. At least. I think it stopped actually," Leclerc said. "But hey, if it's in the cards, it's in the cards."
Cindy Fortin made 33 saves for Norwich, and Mackrell finished with 28.
Norwich got "manhandled," as Bolding put it, 7-2 at Stafford Jan. 26 — its first-ever game against the Cardinals — and the coach said his team learned from that. Leclerc said when Brittane Michaud made it 1-1 in the first period Saturday, the Cadets really started to believe they had a chance.
Plattsburgh State (23-3-2) often had trouble breaking the puck out, but coach Kevin Houle said its defensive-zone play was pretty solid until the last two minutes.
"They positioned themselves well on the forecheck, and they took away options," Houle said. "The bottom line is that we battled and played in our own end and kept the puck out of our net. Obviously we'd like to be in their end a lot more, but we kept the puck out of the middle and didn't give up the turnovers until the very end of the game."
Houle said he thought the Cardinals started playing better in the third period, leading up to Gove's goal.
"And then the roof falls in on you," he said. "Words can't explain it."
—
Norwich 3, Plattsburgh State 2
Norwich102—3
Plattsburgh State101—2
First period- 1, PS, Flattery, 11:26. 2, N, Michaud (Perez, Leclerc), 14:47.
Third period- 3, PS, Gove (Caldwell), 14:08. 4, N, Leclerc, 18:23. 5, N, Leclerc, 19:18.
Shots on goal:
Norwich61312—31
Plattsburgh State121310—35
Goaltenders (shots-saves): Fortin, N, 35-33. Mackrell, PS, 31-28.
Power plays (goals-opportunities): Norwich 0-3; Plattsburgh State 0-2.
Attendance: 601.
E-mail Courtney Lewis at: clewis@pressrepublican.com
