The Montreal Victoire entered the second intermission down 2-1 to the Boston Fleet on Saturday afternoon at the Bell Centre. For 12 of the players in uniform, and the entire coaching staff, it may have felt a bit like déja vu from last year’s playoffs.
They came out in the third period and outshot Boston 12-0, tying the game and forcing overtime. Of course, overtime hasn’t been especially kind to Montreal against their rivals from Boston either but with 17 seconds remaining in the extra period, Laura Stacey’s diving effort put the loose puck into the open net to give Montreal a 3-2 win.
“We knew it was a big third for us,” said Victoire captain Marie-Philip Poulin. “We needed to put a lot of pressure and we achieved that. We’re really happy with how it finished. Game after game we want to improve. We’re not satisfied and we’re really happy to win this game at the Bell Centre.”
“The playoffs are still hanging over our heads a little bit,” said Stacey about last year’s sweep against Boston where all three games ended in overtime. “It was a huge win for us tonight and an awesome feeling in front of that many fans.”
The 17,324 in attendance at the Bell Centre saw the first Montreal women’s hockey win in the building since 2016, ending a two-game losing streak in the largest arena in North America.
“I thought our energy dipped as a team in the second period and we just needed to find that level of compete that Boston was bringing,” said Montreal head coach Kori Cheverie. “The players took it upon themselves to challenge themselves to come out in the third and make a decision that we were going to take over the game.”
Montreal couldn’t have asked for a better start, scoring on their first shot and first shift just 36 seconds into the game. The puck was pressured on the forecheck and eventually made its way back to Kati Tabin whose wrist shot made it through traffic and wasn’t seen by Boston goaltender Aerin Frankel until it was too late, if at all.
It was the fastest goal scored in team history.
Kati tir précis Tabin?
Kati precised shot Tabin pic.twitter.com/zqfXOO9MWe
— Victoire de Montréal (@PWHL_Montreal) March 1, 2025
With over 17,000 fans cheering a goal after the first shift, it could have been easy for the Fleet to crumble. Even their head coach Courtney Kessel admitted after the game she wasn’t sure which way the game was going to go after that, but Boston recovered and tied the game seven minutes