AMHERST, Mass. – Despite holding a 2-0 lead heading into the third period, the No. 1/1 Plattsburgh State women's ice hockey team settled for a 2-2 overtime tie with Amherst College on Wednesday evening in non-conference action at Orr Rink.
 
Plattsburgh State is ranked at No. 1 in both the USCHO.com Women's Division III Top-10 Poll and the D3hockey.com Women's Top-10 Poll.
 
Freshman forward Abby Brush (Mount Prospect, Ill./Chicago Young Americans) helped lead the Cardinal attack, scoring her first career goal as an intercollegiate student-athlete and adding an assist.
 
The Cardinals applied significant pressure on the Mammoths in the overtime period, spending intense portions of the five-minute extra session in their offensive zone. Several offensive chances helped draw an Amherst cross-checking minor, and freshman defenseman Erin McArdle (Macomb, Mich./Detroit Belle Tire) was denied on a scoring opportunity before a whistle was blown on the delayed penalty with 42 seconds left.
 
With the extra skater, Plattsburgh State's sophomore defenseman Hannah Kiraly (Glendale, Ariz./Northern Cyclones) tested senior goaltender Bailey Plaman with time winding down, but Plaman stood tall to keep the score tied. The Cardinals' final chance came on an offensive-zone face-off with less than two seconds remaining and with a pulled goalie, but they were unable to create a quality scoring chance in that short amount of time and settled for the stalemate.
 
Plattsburgh State moves to 15-2-1 overall with the result and finishes its non-conference slate on Tuesday, Jan. 30, when it visits Middlebury College for a 7 p.m. contest. Amherst moves to 9-5-3 overall with the result and next hosts Williams College on Friday, Jan. 26, at 7 p.m.
 
The Cardinals opened scoring 2:11 into the contest. Brush stole the puck away from an Amherst player in the neutral zone and fed freshman forward Annie Katonka (Pittsburgh, Pa./Pittsburgh Pens Elite) just past the blue line in the offensive zone. Katonka skated into the slot and beat the Mammoth goaltender glove side to give Plattsburgh State an early 1-0 lead.
 
Brush added a goal to her stat line 10:28 into the second period. Freshman defenseman Kerri Corcoran (Rockville, Md./Washington Pride) passed D-to-D to junior defenseman Baye Flanagan (Billerica, Mass./Merrimack College), and Flanagan shot from the left point. Brush was waiting in the slot and redirected the puck into the goal to double the Cardinal advantage.
 
Amherst cut the deficit in half 10:11 into the third period on the power play. Senior forward Alex Toupal passed from the right point to junior forward Jocelyn Hunyadi in the face-off circle. Hunyadi then fed the puck into the slot, where senior forward Emma Griese banged it home.
 
The Mammoths tied the game with just 4:52 left in regulation. Junior forward Katie Savage won a neutral-zone face-off, and sophomore defenseman Ava Simoncelli sent a stretch pass forward to Toupal. Toupal entered the zone along the left boards, and she kept the puck herself on a 2-on-1 rush before going five-hole.
 
The game ended in a tie despite the fact that the Cardinals finished with a 38-25 edge in shots and went 29-for-49 at the face-off dot. Amherst went 1-for-2 on the power play, while Plattsburgh State was unable to convert on either of its two power-play chances.
 
Junior goaltender Kassi Abbott (North Billerica, Mass./Boston Shamrocks Elite) made 23 saves for the Cardinals, while Plaman turned aside 36 shots in net for the Mammoths.