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Pandas upset Huskies 2-1 at U Sports women's hockey championship

Pandas advance at U Sports women's championship

NAPANEE, Ont. — Amy Boucher and Cayle Dillon scored as the Alberta Pandas upset the third-seeded Saint Mary's Huskies 2-1 on Friday at the U Sports women's hockey championship.

The No. 6 Pandas will face No. 7 Concordia in Saturday's semifinals. The Stingers edged No. 2 Guelph 4-3 in a shootout later Friday. 

Alberta goaltender Lindsey Post stopped 20 shots to pick up the win.

"I was really happy with how we started," Alberta coach Howie Draper said. "We had a lot of energy today and we used our speed when we needed to. We're a strong team defensively, I thought we did the job on the defensive side and we got some great goaltending."

Gemma MacDonald scored for Saint Mary's with less than two minutes remaining in regulation. Huskies goalie Rebecca Clark made 23 saves.

"I give Alberta a lot of credit, they had a lot of team speed and really moved the puck well," said Huskies coach Chris Larade.

Saturday's other semifinal will feature top-ranked UBC against No. 4 McGill.

In the second quarter-final of the day, Keriann Schofield and Claudia Dubois scored in the shootout to lead Concordia over the Gryphons.

The Stingers have not appeared in the gold-medal game since 1999.

Caroll-Anne Gagne, Brigitte Laganiere and Sophie Gagnon all scored in the third-period for Concordia, which was down 1-0 after the first. Tracy-Ann Lavigne had two assists.

Katherine Bailey and Stephanie Gava tied the game with third-period goals for the Gryphons. Kaitlin Lowy scored in the first.

 "That game was a huge character win for us," said Stingers coach Julie Chu after the win. "Obviously Guelph is a tremendous team, (and) having to go down 1-0 we had to bounce back and we did with a great second period. That's where we got our momentum and started to play gritty, hard, aggressive hockey.

"In the third period, we both pushed back, so it was a great back-and-forth game. That's what nationals is about."

The Canadian Press