Frost win second straight PWHL Walter Cup title

ST. PAUL, Minn. -- The Walter Cup is staying successful Minnesota and the defending champion Frost erstwhile again person Liz Schepers to recognition for scoring the championship-clinching extremity for a 2nd consecutive year.

Schepers converted a scramble successful beforehand to people 12 minutes into overtime and seal a 2-1 triumph implicit the Ottawa Charge to clinch the rubric successful Game 4 of the best-of-five title bid and adjacent the PWHL's 2nd season.

"Hats disconnected to Ottawa. That was a helluva series," Schepers said. "I could not beryllium much arrogant of our team. It's unbelievable."

All 4 games of the bid were decided by 2-1 scores, and each of them successful overtime, including the Frost's triple-OT triumph successful Game 3 connected Saturday. After losing Game 1 successful Ottawa, the Frost responded with 3 consecutive wins.

Kelly Pannek scored astatine the 10:10 people of the 2nd period, giving Minnesota its archetypal pb successful regularisation of the series. Maddie Rooney stopped 33 shots and finished the playoffs with a 5-0 record.

Katy Knoll, whose overtime extremity sealed Game 3, acceptable up the victor by collecting the puck on the extremity boards and driving down the nett to provender Schepers successful the slot. Goaltender Gwyneth Philips parried the archetypal shot, but Schepers poked location the rebound.

"It was conscionable the commencement of my shift. I knew Katy and Hymla (Klara Hymlarova) were moving truly hard down the extremity enactment and conscionable tried to get lost," Schepers said. "They made a large play to the beforehand of the nett and I was capable to get a mates whacks astatine it and saw the puck spell in. And past I was connected my backmost and the solemnisation was on."

Schepers, who is from Mound, Minnesota, and played collegiately astatine Ohio State, was 1 of 16 Frost players who returned from past year's title team, and this clip got the accidental to observe earlier their location crowd. Minnesota won the inaugural Walter Cup past twelvemonth with Schepers scoring the opening extremity of a 3-0 triumph astatine Boston successful Game 5.

"I'll triumph anywhere. It's ever fun," said Frost defenseman Lee Stecklein successful a crippled played successful beforehand of an announced assemblage of 11,024. "But to get to bash it astatine location is other special."

And conscionable similar past year, the Frost won the rubric arsenic the 4th and final-seeded playoff team, and some times precocious to the finals aft knocking disconnected Toronto successful the semis.

Minnesota sneaked into the playoffs this twelvemonth with an 8-1 triumph implicit Boston connected the last time of the regular season. The triumph led to Ottawa, Minnesota and Boston finishing with 44 points each with the Fleet eliminated based connected having less regularisation wins.

"It's the content we person successful the room," Frost skipper Kendall Coyne Schofield said of the team's resilience.

"It's hard to enactment into words," she added. "I deliberation erstwhile you look astatine the mode we won, it takes everybody. That was past year, and this twelvemonth was nary different. ... It took each azygous subordinate stepping up successful immoderate way, shape, oregon form."

The Charge, Canada's archetypal squad to scope the finals, forced overtime connected Tereza Vanisova's extremity with 9:51 near successful the 3rd period. It was her archetypal extremity of the playoffs and ended an 11-game extremity drought.

Philips finished with 36 saves and was won the Ilana Kloss Trophy arsenic playoff MVP. The rookie finished the playoffs with a 4-4 record, with each 4 losses coming successful overtime. She finished with 148 saves successful overtime alone, portion allowing conscionable 13 goals connected 270 shots for a .952 prevention percent and 1.23 goals-against average.

"Right present the idiosyncratic grant is superseded by the squad loss," Philips said. "We were truthful adjacent and we truly wanted that, but my accomplishments are attributed to the players successful beforehand of me. So possibly time volition beryllium nicer, but I truly wanted to win."

The rookie from Ohio took implicit the starting duties aft Emerance Maschmeyer was sidelined by a little assemblage wounded successful mid-March. Both teams had their chances successful the other period.

Ottawa's Aneta Tejralova, connected a rush, deed the near station with a changeable astir 5 minutes into overtime and the Frost's Taylor Heise deed the close station astir 4 minutes later.

Both teams look large changes entering the offseason arsenic each of the PWHL's six teams volition suffer 4 players successful the enlargement process -- a signing play followed by an enlargement draught -- successful aboriginal June erstwhile Vancouver and Seattle statesman gathering their archetypal rosters.

"I deliberation that's the toughest part," Charge skipper Brianne Jenner said, referring to the upcoming losses. "That was a peculiar run. And it's going to sting for a while, for sure. But really, truly arrogant of this group."