GUELPH, ON – Just like most of the rest of us, the Guelph Gryphons women's hockey team had some rust to shake off in the first week of 2017. But shake it off they did, and they rolled to a 4-1 win over the visiting Waterloo Warriors in OUA action on Thursday at the Gryphon Centre.
 
"For our girls it was just getting our legs back underneath us," said Gryphs head coach Rachel Flanagan. "We had to manage our shifts a little better after the second period, and I thought we did better in the third."
 
"Our goal was to get better every period," agreed forward Claire Merrick, who scored two goals, "and I think we did that."
 
The Gryphs entered this contest not having played a real game since Nov. 26. Several practices and a 3-on-3 mini-tournament in the past two weeks couldn't take the place of real game action, and it showed early on as both teams struggled through a scoreless first period, combining for only seven shots on goal.
 
Rookie forward Stephanie Gava, from Mississauga, ON, got the home team on the board seven minutes into the middle frame. Merrick, a second-year player from Oakville, ON, scored her first goal of the game four minutes later to make it 2-0.
 
But the Warriors weren't ready to give up. Marissa Redmond marched her team down the ice and beat Guelph netminder Valerie Lamenta only seven seconds after Merrick's goal.
 
Waterloo pressed for the tying marker after that, but Lamenta wasn't beaten again. The third-year goalie from Montreal made 19 saves on the night.
 
"We knew that they were going to bring some effort," Flanagan said of the Warriors, who played three games in an exhibition tournament they hosted last weekend. "They've got some talent, and they're fast and hard to play against. They're pretty disciplined in their systems. We knew coming in that it was going to be a battle."
 
Merrick scored again near the midway point of the third period, cashing in a rebound off a point shot by Katherine Bailey. "I was in the right spot at the right times," she said modestly of her two goals.
 
Brittany St James ended the scoring with just over six minutes left, taking a long pass from Bailey and walking in all alone on Waterloo goalie Stephanie Sluys. Flanagan cited St. James' goal as an example of how she's teaching her team to keep their shifts short and not be selfish.
 
"It's knowing that if you only take a 25-second shift but the next player that goes on the ice is the one that scores the goal, you contributed to that," the coach said. "That's what happened on our fourth goal. Syd (Sydney Davison) came off, Jamer hopped on out the other door, and we got a fast break from it."
 
The win keeps the Gryphons atop the OUA standings with a 10-2-2-1 record and 35 points. Waterloo remains in third place in the 13-team league at 6-2-5-1.
 
Merrick agreed that the team will start to feel the pressure to remain in top spot as the regular season begins to wind down. Guelph has nine games left, starting with another home contest on Wednesday, January 11 against Ryerson.
 
"We just have to keep getting better every game," she said. "We know the games are tight, but wherever we can get three points, we want the three points."