Brittney Gout and Nara Elia scored their first goals of the season to lead the St. Lawrence University women's hockey team to a 4-1 win over Syracuse in a non-league game on Friday night at Appleton Arena in Canton, New York.
 
Elia opened up scoring early in the first, recording her first goal as a Saint to give St. Lawrence a 1-0 lead just over four and a half minutes in. Suyeon Eom passed it to Rachel Bjorgan at the blue line and Bjorgan made a centering pass to Elia. Elia deked out the goal tender to find the back of the net.
 
Gout's goal came eight minutes later, at the 8:49 mark, to put the Saints up 2-0. Kristina Bahl tipped the puck to Aly McLeod, who sent the puck up the ice to finding Gout. Shots were even at 10 each after the first.
 
Late in the second, Rachel Bjorgan improved the lead to 3-0 with her second goal of the year. Shailynn snow connected with Elia off a turnover, who passed the puck to Bjorgan at the blue line. Bjorgan fired it from the top of the left circle and past Syracuse goaltender Arielle DeSmet's shoulder.
 
Syracuse finally got on the board with 3:10 to play in the second. Abby Moloughney got credited with the goal off the shot from the left circle. 
 
Shots were again even following the second, with eight apiece.
 
Rachel Teslak also scored her second of the year, putting the Saints up 4-1. Sophie Holden passed the puck up to Teslak, who fired it from the point and the puck bounced past DeSmet.
 
"We got off to a good start and had some success in the first part of the period," said head coach Chris Wells '92. "Syracuse really started to come on and took it to us for the remainder of the first and the second. Lucy made some big saves to bail us out and we were opportunistic on our third goal to settle things down. In the third period we played hard and we were able to finish off the game."


 
Syracuse had several good chances, but Saints' goaltender Lucy Morgan kept the Saints in the lead, finishing the night with 23 saves and a .958 save percentage. Syracuse goaltender Allison Small was between the pipes for the first period and finished with eight saves. DeSmet played the second and third for the Orange and finished with 19.
 
The Saints finished with a 28-24 advantage in shots, while Syracuse had a 28-27 edge in the faceoff circle.
 
With the win, St. Lawrence improved to 2-0-1 on the season, while Syracuse 0-1-0. The Saints will host the Orange again tomorrow in Appleton Arena at 2 p.m.