UConn Women’s Hockey Team Defeats Holy Cross to play Hockey East Finals

By Daniel Feuerstein | March 3rd, 2026 | Storrs, CT

Huskies Thrashed the Crusaders

The Semi-Finals of the Hockey East Women’s Playoffs were played at the Toscano Family Ice Forum as sixth-ranked UConn hosted 17th-ranked Holy Cross. Two of the toughest sides in Women’s Hockey battled each other for the right to reach the Hockey East Women’s Championship Final. After 60 minutes of thrilling playoff college hockey, it would be the UConn Huskies that took a bite out of the Crusaders, winning by the final score of six to one, and they will face Northeastern for the Hockey East Championship.

Game Recap:

UConn began on the power play with a lovely tic-tac-toe passing play before they got the opening goal. Meghane Duchesne-Chalifoux was at the near point and delivered a hard crossice pass to Claire Murdoch at the far point. She quickly sent it back down low to Kyla Josifovic inside the near faceoff circle, and she snapped the shot in for the power play goal at 11:15 of the first period. Holy Cross would get its chance to tie the game and did so on the power play. Lulu Rourke led Hannah Deck with a nice pass down the slot and took the shot. The initial chance was saved, but the rebound was put home by Violett Carroll at 18:21 of the first period.

After the first intermission, UConn took the game over and never looked back. They took advantage every time they had the puck and made their shots count. The UConn Huskies skated inside the zone as Megan Woodworth was coming down the middle and made the pass to her right to find Julia Pellerin, who snapped a quick shot as she took advantage of a screen on Abby Hornung going short side at 3:49 of the second period to regain the lead. UConn got its second power play and scored on it for a two-goal lead. They were buzzing around the net and tried to stuff the puck in, but when the original shot from Maya Serdachny was saved, the rebound was picked up by Woodworth and scored at 18:11 of the second period.

UConn quickly got a third inside the final minute of the second period as chaos ensued inside the Holy Cross’ zone. Murdoch was at the top of the zone when she sent the puck down toward the net, forcing Hornun to make a save, and she slid out of her crease. That left a juicy rebound for Ashley Allard to sweep it in and make it a four-to-one game at 19: 29 of the second period. A fifth goal was added after a rebound shot was put home. Livvy Dewar took a shot at the net and left a nice rebound for Serdachny to put it home at 10:41 of the third period. Christina Walker scored the final goal of the game at 16:22 of the third period to cement the victory.

But the big moment of the game was back in the second period when Tia Chan made two big saves in her crease. Her initial save was toward the near post, but the rebound went toward the far side, where a Holy Cross player was ready to put the rebound home. Chan made a miraculous second save as she leapt toward the far post and got her glove in the right place to make the huge save. The score at the time was two-to-one, and that save allowed UConn to keep the lead and take over the game from that point on, as they will be in the Hockey East finals.

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