No. 13 St. Cloud State Women’s Hockey Wins 2023 Ice Breaker Championship

Saturday, October 21

Fairfield, Conn.

4:00 P.M. CT

St. Cloud State

1-0-0

Lindenwood

0-1-0

Lindenwood

St. Cloud St.

Photo Credits // Joshua Gee

No. 13 St. Cloud State Women’s Hockey Wins 2023 Ice Breaker Championship

10/21/2023 7:30:00 PM | Women's Hockey

Box Score

Hymlárová records natural hat trick, Chobak logs 34-save shutout as Huskies blank Lindenwood 5-0

FAIRFIELD, Conn. –No. 13 St. Cloud State Women's Hockey (7-2-0, 2-1-0 WCHA) shut out Lindenwood (3-5-0, 0-0-0 CHA) 5-0 on Saturday afternoon at Martire Family Arena to earn the 2023 Women's Ice Breaker Championship. Fifth-year forward Klára Hymlárová recorded her second collegiate hat trick in the win while senior goaltender Jojo Chobak turned away 34 saves for her first shutout of the season and junior defender Devyn Millwater scored her first collegiate goal. All three were named to the Ice Breaker All-Tournament Team with Hymlárová earning Most Outstanding Player honors.

Chobak was dominant between the pipes for SCSU, turning away all 34 shots she faced including a whopping 18 saves in the third period. She backed the penalty kill unit extremely well as the Huskies went 8-for-8 on the kill with one shorthanded goal, supporting their tender by excelling on the power play by going 2-for-3.

Millwater opened the scoring just 11 seconds into the game with her first college goal, throwing one in from just inside the blue line above the left circle. Her shot came at a difficult angle for the tender to handle, going above the shoulder to make it 1-0. Graduate forward CC Bowlby pushed the SCSU lead to 2-0 with a shorthanded strike just over 15 minutes later, collecting a loose puck in neutral ice and rocketing home a wrister after skating down to the right side of the high slot.

Hymlárová scored the first goal of her natural hat trick on the power play eight minutes into the second period, launching a snipe from the high point through traffic to give SCSU a 3-0 lead. She added her second goal of the game two minutes into the third on another long-distance rocket on the power play then completed the hat trick by skating down to the left side of the crease and firing home a wrister on a good feed from fellow fifth-year forward Taylor Lind.

Graduate forward Katie Kaufman provided a multi-point game with a pair of assists while 10 Huskies recorded at least one point in the win. Junior defenders Dayle Ross and Taylor Larson shared the team lead in blocks with Millwater at two a piece.

QUOTABLES – St. Cloud State head coach Brian Idalski

"We got a great start today – competed how we wanted to coming out and played with the lead, so happy with that. Overall, too many penalties. We got a lot of work on the penalty kill, we need to be able to adjust a little bit better with that. I'm happy for Jojo to get the shutout and keep that going as a club. Also a great weekend for Klára – she was terrific all the way around with the penalty kill, power play and 5-on-5 – super good weekend for her."

"I thought we were executing well on the kill – spent some time on the forecheck and how we wanted to execute that coming into their zone. I thought we were more comfortable with the structure of it and what we're trying to do, got some different people some looks. I'm happy with that part – but we can't take that many penalties against top 10 opponents in the WCHA. That's going to be a big issue for us. We need to be a little bit better in that regard."

On the incredible work by Chobak and Ahola this season… "I think anyone that follows us and the WCHA is already aware of the fact that we have two quality goaltenders. That's obviously a luxury for us, we have faith in both – they both play at a high level and have for a long time. It's awesome to have that. I think both of them help push each other to bet better, so it's been the perfect storm for us in regards to their development in challenging and pushing each other to be better."

"We have some more depth, we have some more talent – but playing the right way, playing hard all the time, just the compete level and execution – we still have a long way to go. We still have a lot of room for growth and where we need to be. This is the end of nonconference, and now it gets to the weekend-to-weekend of the WCHA. That starts with us getting back and getting ready to go against Mankato, then you've got Wisconsin. The real grind starts now, and we'll see where we're at."

NOTABLES

Klára Hymlárová recorded her second collegiate hat trick and first natural hat trick while going 13-7 (65.0%) on draws and putting five shots on goal
Jojo Chobak recorded 34 saves while logging her first shutout of the season
Katie Kaufman provided two assists
CC Bowlby scored her fifth goal of the season and the Huskies' first shorthanded goal of the year
Devyn Millwater scored her first collegiate goal while blocking two shots
Dayle Ross led SCSU with six shots on goal to go with two blocked shots
Ella Anick put five shots on goal and provided an assist
Taylor Larson, Alice Sauriol, Laura Zimmermann, Taylor Lind and Sofianna Sundelin each provided an assist
The Huskies went 8-for-8 on the penalty kill while going 2-for-3 on the power play
SCSU was outshot 34-31

UP NEXT
The Huskies return to WCHA play next weekend with a road series at (RV) Minnesota State on October 27-28.

Information regarding single game and season tickets can be found at scsutickets.com. For all the latest on St. Cloud State Women's Hockey, stay tuned to SCSUHuskies.com and follow the team on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook.