Box Score The Lancer Women's Hockey team opened up their best of three OUA quarter final series against the Queen's Gaels Thursday night with a convincing 6-1 win at South Windsor Arena.

The Lancers, who finished sixth in the regular season, scored the game's first six goals and rolled to a 6-1 win  over the Gaels, who are ranked No. 7 in the CIS and finished third in the conference.  With the win, the Lancers take a 1-0 series lead as they head to Kingston for games two and three at the Cataraqui Arena.
 
On Thursday night, Windsor was led by three point performances from both Courtney Spoors (Kingsville, Ont.) and Kayla Dodson (Windsor, Ont.). The Lancers used home ice to their advantage early with a goal from Spoors only 3:17 into the opening period to give the number six seed the upper hand.

“The first goal's always the biggest and for me that was a big goal because I've been struggling a little bit in the regular season,” said Spoors, whose eight goals in 24 regular-season games were her lowest total in three seasons with the Lancers. “We've been in a rut and couldn't get any bounces. Tonight was a different story."

Ally Strickland (Essex, Ont.) scored a shorthanded marker just over four minutes later and Spoors followed with a shorthanded goal of her own to give Windsor a comfortable 3-0 lead after one. Windsor outshot the Gaels17-9 in the period.

“We play a very aggressive penalty kill,” said Lancers third-year forward Candice Chevalier, who is from Essex. “As soon as they got the puck, we wanted to be on them. Our penalty kill was up near the top of the league this year, but we haven't been able to score many short-handed goals."

“It was a big win for us because we haven't beaten Queen's all year,” added Chevalier, whose team lost all three regular-season meetings between the two teams. “Coming in as the underdog, we knew we had a lot to prove."

Windsor kept the offence coming in the second period tallying three goals once more and chasing Gaels netminder Mel Dodd-Moher (Stittsville, Ont.) from the goal.

“I don't think we've scored six goals in our last seven games, total,” Lancers head coach Jim Hunter said. “We got some bounces tonight and we needed that.”

The Gaels, who had five of the game's seven power plays, finally got on the board in the third period with captain Kristin Smith spoiling the shutout bid of Lancers goalie Karlyle Robinson.
Windsor didn't let the Gaels get any closer as Robinson finished with 30 saves to secure the win and put the Lancers up 1-0 in the best-of-three series.
 
Game two will take place Saturday February 16th at 7:30pm at the Cataraqui Arena in Kingston. Game three will be Sunday at 3:00pm, if necessary.

“We need to take advantage of this win and keep the momentum going,” Spoors said. “Winning this first game at home, now we only need to win one more up there.
“I think if we come out like (Thursday), and put some pucks at the net we can come out of there with a win.”