The Quinnipiac Bobcats (6-3-0) were unable to complete the sweep of Clarkson (5-5-1) this weekend. The Golden Knights handled the Bobcats 3-1 on Sunday despite being outshot by 20 and giving up five power-plays to Quinnipiac.

“It is interesting, we lost but I am really proud of our team,” said Cass Turner, Quinnipiac women’s ice hockey coach. “I thought we played really well, we put a lot of pucks on net today and their goalie played tremendously. We couldn’t finish, but it was a very important weekend for us since I think we started to understand how fast we can play.”

Clarkson got the scoring started with less than five minutes remaining in the first period thanks to a goal from graduate student forward Sena Hanson. Hanson put in the rebound off of a centering pass in front of the net. Clarkson outshot Quinnipiac in the first period 9-8.

The Bobcats had more energy in the second period and had a lot of chances. Halfway through the second, they led the shots-on-goal battle 18-13 and were putting the Golden Knights defense on their heels. Freshman goaltender Michelle Paisechnyk stole a couple of opportunities from Quinnipiac despite the consistent scoring chances.

The Bobcats had a large quantity of pucks on net but failed to get a lot of those opportunities close to the net.

“In those times, we do need to take it to the net,” said Quinnipiac senior forward Grace Markey. “That does make the goalie more nervous and the closer we get and the more people we have crashing the net it will go in more. We definitely do need to do that.”

Turner liked the aggressiveness and the amount of shots the Bobcats took but did see an opportunity for higher quality chances as well.

“We can put ourselves in better positions to score,” Turner said. “We took a lot of shots from out wide so I think we need to put ourselves in more dangerous scoring areas and get pucks moving east to west in order to score against good goalies.”

After a couple of penalties in front of the net led to a 4-on-4, Clarkson extended its lead to 2-0 after a quick wrist shot from sophomore forward Gabrielle David in the high slot. Quinnipiac led the period in shots 19-7 but had nothing to show for it after two periods.

The Bobcats had a number of power-play chances in the second and third period but did not capitalize on any. It was 0-5 on the power-play both today and yesterday and neither team took advantage of the man-advantage this weekend.

“We have some things to sort through on special teams,” Turner said. “We have a lot of people on our special teams which is very good and it has been developing players, but we need to be sure to get the right combinations of players going forward so we can score goals on the power-play.”

Clarkson got another goal early in the third period from senior defender Avery Mitchell who notched her third of the season.

Quinnipiac responded just minutes later with its first goal of the day from senior forward Renee Saltness off a rebound for her fifth of the season, but it wasn’t enough. The Bobcats outshot the Golden Knights 16-7 in the third period, good for 35-14 in the final two frames.

The Bobcats return to play on Jan. 30, against St. Lawrence in Hamden at 2 p.m.