Box Score

BIDDEFORD, Maine -- Sophomore Grace Murphy (Montclair, Va.) scored three times to lead the Nichols College Bison to a 7-4 victory over the University of New England in college women's ice hockey action Saturday (Nov. 10) afternoon at the Harold Alfond Forum.

The win evened Nichols' record at 2-2 and halted a two-game losing skid. It was the fourth outing of the season for the Nor'easters (0-1), but their first against a varsity program.

Murphy notched her hat-trick in the opening 25:33 of the contest. With the scored tied 2-2, Murphy scored back-to-back goals in the early stages of the second period to give Nichols the lead for good. Two of her tallies came on the power play.

After Murphy built a two-goal advantage for the Bison, sophomore Samantha Vicari (Wayne, N.J.) scored later in the second to give the visitors a 5-2 advantage after two frames.

Nichols extended its lead to 7-2 midway thru the third on markers by sophomore Alyssa Bufis (Linden, N.J.) and junior Megan Gerein (Dubuque, Iowa) before the Nor'easters found the cage twice in the closing minutes to make the final margin 7-4.

Sophomore Lisa Coskren (Norwood, Mass.) had a goal and three assists for the Bison, who held a 36-19 advantage in shots on goal and converted 3 of 4 power-play opportunities. First-year goaltender Nia Kelly (Cary, N.C.) made 15 stops to pick up the win.

UNE was paced offensively by first-years Shannon Reynolds (Belmont, Mass.) and Marissa Clifford-Biederman (Lee, N.H.), who scored two goals apiece. Junior captain Jenni Poulin (Pembroke, N.H.) assisted on three of UNE's four scores.

Starter Samantha Scobee (Minnetrista, Minn.) registered 25 saves in just under 50 minutes of action before giving way to Courtney Kendall (Waltham, Mass.), who had four stops the rest of the way.

Both teams return to the ice next Friday (Nov. 16). Nichols travels to Salve Regina University (7:30 p.m.), while the Nor'easters host Franklin Pierce University at 3:30 p.m.