It’s not often that you see a period of hockey where there are more penalty minutes than minutes played.
However, that’s how the Boston Fleet and Ottawa Charge kicked off their semifinal series Thursday night.
The first period of Game 1 featured a whopping 25 penalty minutes. The Fleet took three minor penalties, plus a major and a game misconduct, while the Charge took three minors.
“It’s a lot of penalties,” Fleet head coach Kris Sparre told reporters postgame. “You don’t see that too often in a playoff game. It’s not the way you draw it up in the first period [to have to] kill a five minor major. But I liked our pressure.”
Jocelyne Larocque snuck one past Aerin Frankel midway through the five-minute major, but that was the only successful power play of the night for either team. In total, the Fleet killed off 11:35 seconds of Ottawa power plays, and it gave them a chance to win. The importance of special teams is heightened in the playoffs, and the Fleet’s penalty kill, which has been excellent all season, proved that tonight.
As if 25 minutes of penalties in the first period were not enough, three overlapped, creating some rarely seen strengths. Rylind MacKinnon’s five-minute major for an illegal check to the head ran into Brianne Jenner’s minor for roughing. Then, both of those bled into Gwyneth Philips’ tripping minor. It led to the teams playing 31 seconds of 4v4 hockey, followed by 54 seconds of a Fleet 4v3 power play, then 35 seconds of a Fleet 5v3, and finally finishing with 31 seconds of a standard Boston 5v4 advantage.
“It wasn’t easy,” Alina Müller told reporters postgame about playing at so many strengths in such a short span. “Definitely hard, it’s like a fluid change of how many men are on the ice. Definitely didn’t execute the way we wanted. But, now we can look at the video and try to do better next time. Special teams, in the end, are really important in playoffs.”
After the chaotic first period came to a close, both teams settled down. Each took just one minor per period over the next 40 minutes. That allowed the Fleet to return to their style of hockey, which features a strong defensive structure that the Charge struggled mightily to get through. Meanwhile, the Fleet peppered Philips with numerous high-danger chances. Eventually, Müller put the Fleet on the board with a silky goal off a nice feed from Jessie Eldridge. Just 1:31 later, Jamie Lee Rattray scored her first PWHL playoff goal when she poked the puck underneath Philips while falling. That was all the offense the Fleet needed, as they took Game 1 by a final of 2-1.
“I like that we stuck with it,” Sparre said postgame. “We had some good opportunities early in the game that didn’t go for us. But that’s why we talk a lot during the season about big moments and staying composed, because the higher the stakes, we’re gonna need that.”