MONTREAL — After a 24-hour delay due to an illness on the team, the Montreal Victoire punched their ticket to the PWHL’s Walter Cup Finals with a 2-1 win against the Minnesota Frost on Tuesday night.
With the fifth and deciding game of the semifinal series finally underway, Minnesota came out flying with yet another quick start, pinning Montreal into its own zone for most of the opening 10 minutes; the Victoire didn’t officially register a shot on goal until the eight-minute mark.
Still, Ann-Renée Desbiens held her ground — pulling a puck right off the goal line on one save — and kept Minnesota scoreless, despite the Frost’s 9-1 advantage in shots midway through the first period. That early game performance by Desbiens allowed Montreal to take the first lead of the game when Catherine Dubois fired a shot above Maddie Rooney’s outreached stick 12:18 into the opening frame.
Midway through the second period, Minnesota forward Sam Cogan tied the game 1-1 to set up a winner-takes-all third period, where none other than Marie-Philip Poulin scored the game-winner to capture Montreal’s first-ever playoffs series win.
Desbiens made 25 saves on 26 shots to seal the victory in her best game of the postseason so far.
The Victoire will now move on to play the Ottawa Charge in a best-of-five series for the league’s Water Cup championship.
The loss – Minnesota’s first when facing elimination – marked an early end for the Frost, which won back-to-back championships in the league’s first two seasons.
Dubois makes an impact
Ahead of the game, Montreal coach Korie Cheverie made one major adjustment to her lineup: moving Catherine Dubois, a versatile depth forward, onto the top line beside Poulin and Laura Stacey.
While Minnesota had most of the offensive zone time in the first period, it still took less than 13 minutes for the move to pay off. On a set play, Poulin – who was lined up against Kelly Pannek, one of the premier face-off centers in the game – won the offensive zone faceoff clean, snapping the puck back to an awaiting Dubois, who fired the puck above Maddie Rooney.
A goal that big coming from Dubois shouldn’t be a surprise. In the 2024 postseason, Dubois scored the game-winner in Montreal’s quadruple overtime marathon – and the longest game in PWHL history – against Boston. And this season, when Poulin missed time due to injury, it was Dubois who moved up to the top line with Stacey and Abby Roque, scoring four goals to help lead Montreal in their captain’s absence.
Poulin is clutch again
Whatever is going on with Marie-Philip Poulin’s leg, it did not stop her from scoring another huge goal in the biggest game of her PWHL career.
Montreal’s captain missed 10 games after the Olympics with a lower-body injury and refused to bite on a question about how healthy she felt heading into the postseason.
“The heart, the mind is there,” she said. “So I’m going to do anything possible to play my game.”
That game has been the very best in women’s hockey for over a decade, and defined by clutch moment after clutch moment. It’s been clear throughout the series that Poulin is not 100 percent. At times, she’s been shown wincing on the bench. After Poulin scored the triple-overtime winner in Game 3, Stacey gave Poulin the team’s player of the game hat, saying Poulin “has battled really (expletive) hard to be able to even be on that ice with us.”
None of that seemed to matter, though, when Poulin scored her second game-winning goal of the series.
An unusual postponement
It’s incredibly rare for a playoff game in professional sports to be postponed. Outside of the COVID-19 pandemic, teams have typically played through illnesses – with a short bench or using emergency call-ups – in both the regular season and playoffs.
That’s part of what made the PWHL’s postponement of Game 5 so shocking. According to a league statement, “The decision was made following consultation with medical personnel and in accordance with the league’s commitment to the health and wellbeing of players, fans, staff and all those involved in the competition.”
Then came the announcement mere hours after the postponement that the game would be played Tuesday night. A league spokesperson confirmed to The Athletic that the guidance from medical professionals was that play could resume Tuesday. According to CBC’s Karissa Donkin, no additional players were sick as of Tuesday morning.
“No new symptoms have been identified since the postponement decision was made, and those who previously experienced symptoms are continuing to improve,” PWHL spokesperson Paul Krotz said on Tuesday. “In addition, enhanced cleaning and disinfecting measures were enacted across team environments as an added precaution.”
The league did not specify the nature of the illness – other than to say the symptoms aren’t consistent with hantavirus – nor did it reveal how many players were sick. According to a source briefed on the situation, the illness was contained to the Victoire, with nobody on the Frost sick as of Monday evening.
By puck drop on Tuesday, all 23 regular skaters were in the Victoire lineup.
This story will be updated.
This article originally appeared in The Athletic.
Minnesota Frost, Montreal Victoire, NHL, Women’s Hockey
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