GRAND FORKS, N.D. --- The University of North Dakota women's hockey team may have kept its NCAA postseason hopes alive by surviving an upset bid by Bemidji State. UND got off to a quick start but needed extra time to edge the Beavers, 4-3, at the Ralph Engelstad Arena Friday.
The overtime-winner came off the stick of Allison Parizek (Minot, N.D.), fittingly by a senior who wants to extend her career at UND by giving it another chance in the NCAA Tournament, scoring likely her biggest goal of her career.
Even a tie tonight for UND would have severely hurt its chances at an at-large bid and made its chances of advancing to the tournament a longshot without claiming the auto-bid by winning the WCHA Tournament.
North Dakota improves to 19-10-0 overall (14-9-0-0 WCHA) while BSU drops to 6-19-2 and 5-17-1-0 in the league.
UND jumped out to an early lead with two power-play goals in the first seven minutes of the game including finding the back of net twice in its first four shots.
With the absence of four players in Europe competing for their respective national teams, UND had some different personal getting power-play time including freshman Shannon Kaiser (Crookston, Minn.) who took advantage for the game's first goal at the 5:05 mark.
Meghan Dufault (Winnipeg, Manitoba) tallied UND's second power-play goal only 1:45 after its first for the early two-goal lead.
UND didn't allow a shot until just over 11 minutes into the game, but Emily Erickson scored from behind the net on a centering attempt that directed off of netminder Shelby Amsley-Benzie and into the net at 11:41 of the first stanza.
UND answered right back scoring only 21-seconds later as Kohler powered a rebound past Abby Ryplanski for her second goal of the season and the game's fourth goal in its first eight shots combined.
A failed rush for UND led to a 2-on-1 opportunity for BSU the other way and it converted off a rebound to cut the lead to 3-2. Amsley-Benzie stopped the first shot but Natasha Kostenko was able to score on the second attempt.
BSU would even the game with the lone goal of the second period as for the second time in the game it scored from bellow the goal line. Another centering attempt ricocheted off Amsley-Benzie's stick and through her five-hole to square the game at 6:22 of the middle frame.
The rest of regulation would go scoreless but both teams would survive late power-play attempts by the other team.
After scoring on its first two power-play attempts and the first two opportunities of the game for either team, UND was called for the next four-straight penalties including one with just over two minutes remaining in regulation.
UND killed the penalty and finished the game 4-for-4 on BSU attempts. It was then awarded its third attempt of the game with 20 seconds remaining and was looking for its third goal of the game on the man-advantage and the game-winner, but the Beavers came up with a big kill to extend the game.
Parizek scored with 1:02 left on the clock with an unassisted goal that trickled over the goal.
Senior Jocelyne Lamoureux (Grand Forks, N.D.) tallied one assist in the game and is now three points shy of breaking the all-time WCHA scoring record held by Wisconsin's Hillary Knight.
UND will look for the series sweep over the Beavers and extend its current winning streak to six games tomorrow with the opening puck drop set for 7:07 p.m.
