Gophers women’s hockey team completes sweep of St. Thomas

Freshman defender Gracie Graham had a goal and two assists, leading the No. 3 Gophers women’s hockey team to a 5-1 victory over St. Thomas on Saturday at Ridder Arena.

The Gophers (17-5-1, 11-4-1 WCHA), who defeated St. Thomas 4-2 on Friday, have won six of their past seven games.

“We had to battle,” Gophers coach Brad Frost said. “Give St. Thomas credit. They worked their tails off.”

Graham’s first multipoint game of the season began with a goal and assist in the first two minutes of the game.

Her goal gave the Gophers a 1-0 lead just 67 seconds into the game. Less than a minute later, Graham and Natalie Mlynkova assisted on Sydney Morrow’s goal to make it 2-0.

“Gracie has been great,” Frost said. “You wouldn’t know that she’s a freshman. When Sydney has the puck on her stick good things happen.”

The Tommies (5-15-2, 2-13-1) pulled within 2-1 midway through the first period on a power-play goal by Nicole Vallario.

After a scoreless second period, the Gophers scored three times in the third period. Mylnkova made it 3-1 early in the period, and Graham and Morrow assisted on Abbey Murphy’s goal to make it 4-1.

“To go into the third period up 2-1 and get that one early to extend the lead was huge,” Frost said. “It was really fun to see our team play the right way, reloading and making it tough for St. Thomas to generate anything.”

Peyton Hemp’s power-play goal with 3 minutes, 50 seconds remaining completed the scoring.

Mlynkova, Morrow and Murphy each had a goal and assist and Nelli Laitinen had two assists for the Gophers.

The Gophers play a home-and-home series with Minnesota State Mankato next weekend — Friday at Ridder Arena and Saturday in Mankato.

St. Thomas plays host to top-ranked and WCHA-leading Wisconsin next weekend.