With their momentum from last week’s upset over #10 Princeton, RPI showed up Friday night excited and confident. Although the Saints needed less than two minutes to light up the scoreboard, it took SLU until the end of the third to safely put the game away. After junior Brooke Thompson scored, the game was tied at one until 16 minutes into the second when Kerri Wallace put the Saints ahead 2-1. SLU added two more in the third period including an open net goal to finish off RPI 4-1.

“The game against St. Lawrence was a very close one,” said second-year captain senior Sarah Daniel. “I think we handled the pressure of playing against a top ten team really well this time around. St. Lawrence is right up there with Harvard and Dartmouth in our league, but instead of getting nervous like we did in our first two games of the season we just got excited and fired up, which shows just how far we’ve come so far this year. We have a lot of trust in each other now and are starting to realize what we’re capable of.”

“We played exceptionally well against St. Lawrence,” said Head Coach John Burke. “We had a chance to win that game.”

The next night was a 4-3 triumph over league and historic rival, the Clarkson Golden Knights. The teams have only met three times, but that doesn’t stop the teams from finding passion in the heated rivalry.

Rensselaer was again beat to the scoreboard as Clarkson easily went up 2-0. The team, however, finally pulled itself together and responded in kind with four unanswered goals during 11 minutes of play through the second and third periods. “The rivalry with Clarkson is definitely strong enough to savor a victory over them,” said Daniel. “This was the third time we’ve played them since their program started, so our history with them is not long but it has been very charged with excitement and enmity. Against Clarkson we did a good job of jumping on loose pucks and wound up on the right side of some lucky bounces for once, so it was a very exciting game for us to win. Beating Clarkson is always fun.”

Overcoming a slow start, the Engineers again relied on stellar goaltending by the reigning ECAC Hockey League Goaltender of the Week Ashley Mayr. She stopped 30 shots during the game while the only shots that got past her were the three power play goals.

RPI rematches both SLU and Clarkson in the last weekend of play during mid-February. Depending on points in the league, these could be vital games for any of the three teams as they look to make the playoff cut. This weekend could be a good evaluation of how the ever-improving Engineers could fare in those games.

“This weekend was a great one for us, not only by taking two points from Clarkson,” said Daniel, “but also by proving something to ourselves about the level of teams we can play with.”

“It was a great weekend to go up to the North Country, it’s a tough road trip—you always want to get a sweep but at least come away with a split,” said Burke.

The team makes another road trip this weekend, heading to Hamilton on Friday to play the formidable Colgate Raiders (10-3-1) who are just under SLU in the ECAC.

After a close 0-1 loss to Colgate early in December, the team is excited for the rematch. “We’re looking forward to having another great game at their place,” said Burke.