The St. Thomas Tommies downed the Dalhousie Tigers 6-2 in game one of the AUS women's hockey best-of-three quarterfinal series Wednesday night at the Grant-Harvey Centre.
Kelty Apperson powered the Tommies with three goals, recording her second consecutive hat trick.
"We've never had anybody who's had hat tricks back to back," Tommies head coach Peter Murphy said after the game. "Apperson, the way she's playing, it's because she's everywhere. She's coming on back checks and she's doing the things we take pride in as a team."
It was the Tigers that opened the scoring, though—just 33 seconds into the game—with Jessie Rietveld capitalizing on the backhand.
Taylor Reichheld doubled the Tigers' lead at 14:10 after chipping the puck over Taylor Cook's shoulder, but Kelty Apperson responded two minutes later, scoring off a great individual effort to cut the Tommies deficit to 2-1.
Shots on goal in the frame favoured the Tommies, 14-8.
"Obviously we didn't like the first shift. We aren't convinced that Cook saw that first shot," Murphy said.
"I wasn't real happy with most of the first period. Some of the things we know we have to do, we weren't doing. So there's still lots of work to do."
The Tommies rallied and took over in the second, dominating much of the possession. They were rewarded midway through the frame on a shorthanded breakout that saw Apperson finish a great dish from Teah Anderson for her second of the game.
The Tommies took a 3-2 lead with just 20 seconds to go in the period with Apperson burying her third of the game off a tight-angled shot.
Lauren Henman put the Tommies up 4-2 nine minutes into the third with a shot from the slot. The Tommies continued their strong play and added a second shorthanded goal—this time it was Apperson who set up Anderson on the breakout for a 5-2 lead.
"We play an aggressive penalty kill," Murphy said of his team's two shorthanded goals. "I like it when your penalty kill actually scores, it really deflates the other team. It's something that we strive for."
With five minutes to go, Marina Sergina buried a shot top corner to give the Tommies the 6-2 win.
Game two of the quarterfinal playoff series will take place Friday in Halifax, and despite the lopsided result of this game, Murphy said they aren't taking the Tigers lightly.
"The big thing was just talking to them [the team] at the end, because I remember a team that had a game like this about a year ago," Murphy said, referencing last year's series against the Tigers that the Tommies lost 2-1.
"I said let's get our heads on straight and make sure we're preparing as best we can for Friday, because that team's not going to give up."