With eight minutes remaining in the game, Syracuse had a chance to stave off another loss to Mercyhurst. The Orange nearly avoided being winless against the Lakers for the 22nd time in a row.

But Syracuse couldn’t do it. It gave Mercyhurst a tough test. In the end, SU fell to 0-21-1 against the Lakers with a 3-2 loss Saturday.

Holly Carrie-Mattimoe chased a loose puck before Mercyhurst’s Jenna Hendrikx crashed into her and knocked her to the ice. But it wasn’t the typical penalty. Hendrikx was called for game misconduct and contact to the head. The combination landed her a five-minute major and an ejection.

SU had a power play for the next five minutes, but couldn’t capitalize.

“We have to figure out how to manufacture goals and opportunities,” head coach Paul Flanagan said. “I don’t think we even had a good opportunity.”

After the sweep at the hands of Mercyhurst, Syracuse (18-13-1, 12-5-1 College Hockey America) sits five points behind the Lakers (24-6-1, 15-3 CHA) in the conference standings. After dropping the weekend’s opener, Syracuse’s CHA title chances had dimmed, but still existed.

“With first place on the line, it’s still reachable,” Carrie-Mattimoe said after Friday’s loss. “It still matters, and I think the girls know it.”

After squandering a 3-2 lead and falling 5-3 on Friday, the disappointment carried over into Saturday’s matchup, when SU gave up three goals in the first period alone. The Lakers ended up winning the game 3-2. All the damage Mercyhurst needed to deal came in the first period.

“We were playing pretty well,” Flanagan said. “It’s just frustrating and I know the kids are down, but at the same time there’s a lot of character shown tonight by our team.”

Flanagan said the team could have easily let the game get away after they went down 3-0 in the first. But he was proud the team showed resilience and fought back.

Defender Jacquie Greco agreed with Flanagan, and said the team’s start hurt SU the rest of the way.

“We kind of came out to a slow start,” Greco said. “I think, obviously, we responded very well, but if we don’t play a full 60 minutes, that’s what’s going to happen.”

In the first 20 minutes, Mercyhurst outshot SU 17-10 and outscored 3-0. The second period, though, was almost a complete role reversal. The Orange outshot the Lakers 10-5 and outscored them 2-0. But in the third, the roles switched again, despite Syracuse’s major advantage.

The game misconduct left Mercyhurst shorthanded, but as has been the case all season, the Orange failed to exploit on the man-up opportunity.

In the second period, Margot Scharfe scored on a power play and cut the lead to two, but it was the team’s first power-play goal since Jan. 26 against Penn State.

“We have got to have our power plays better prepared,” Flanagan said. “I think anybody in the rink today can figure out what we have to work on. It’s not the $64,000 question.”

Flanagan and members of the team looked to those final eight minutes as the essential reason why they lost. Syracuse failed to stop Mercyhurst in the first when they scored the three goals needed to win, but it was the end of the game where the Orange failed to play well at all.

“That eight minutes is where we just didn’t respond,” Flanagan said. “That’s where we have to get better.”

Published on February 18, 2013 at 1:05 am

Contact David: dlauterb@syr.edu