By David F. Pendrys

NORTHFORD, CT- The Boston Pride managed to put seven unanswered goals into the Whale net Friday, night but the story did not by any means end there. As Connecticut spent two periods having near misses of their own around the Boston net, and the Pride in turn was skating with great effectiveness to set up their onslaught. This included a hat trick from Meghan Duggan. The Whale however didn’t let it all burn, by responding in the third period with 4 goals, three of which came off the stick of Haley Skarupa for a hat trick of her own. The end result was an 8-4 victory for the Pride, but positive signs are buried in it.

All 12 goals can basically be found in the highlight package.

The Whale players post game saw the flourish in the third as a good way to transition into hopefully a better performance vs The Riveters on Sunday. The team was able to finally get the puck in the net after the earlier struggles which returned to the ongoing theme throughout several games of finishing. The question of what it would take for the highly talented team to keep getting the goals they needed.
“Coach talked a lot about getting bodies in front of the net. A lot of our players including myself are kind of finesse so we tend to be playmakers and stay the outside. We need to find our identity and we need to find people to drive the net, including myself, including our finesse players, and we need to get in front of the goalie’s eyes. So a lot of outside shots. We didn’t really test her until the third to be honest,” The Whale’s Sam Faber said after the loss.

“I think it’s just finding each other quicker from behind the net. Quick shots, quick passes, one-timers and just communicating more. I think when we’re all on the same page, it kinda just flows better, and we’ll bury a lot more chances,” Skarupa said as well on the topic of finishing.

The Whale seems to know what they need to do, they just need to do it. The Pride meanwhile is the Pride.

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