MADISON – The Wisconsin women’s hockey team fell flat in its attempt to take control of the WCHA race Saturday, Feb. 7.

In a matchup of the nation’s two top-ranked teams, the second-ranked Buckeyes scored a 4-1 victory over the Badgers at La Bahn Arena to move ahead of UW and into first place.

The teams left the ice with Ohio State (26-3, 20-3 WCHA) leading Wisconsin (24-3-2, 18-3-2) by one point, 58-57.

The game was played without several key players on both sides. Wisconsin’s Caroline Harvey, Kirsten Simms, Laila Edwards and Ava McNaughton are competing for Team USA at the Olympics while Adela Sapovalivova represents Czechia. Ohio State played without leading scorer Joy Dunne, one of four players on the roster at the Olympics.

BOX SCORE: No. 2 Ohio State 4, No. 1 Wisconsin 1

The Badgers can climb back to the top of the standings with a victory in the series finale at 2 p.m. Sunday, but they’ll need to come out of the gates better, do a better job of avoiding penalties and be more effective at finishing their chances.

“Generally with everybody we need a little bit better effort,” Badgers coach Mark Johnson said. “If you watch the game like I was watching it they seemed to in a lot of situations give a little bit extra effort and that to me over the course of 60 minutes probably made the biggest difference.” 

The Badgers would have been shut out were it not for junior Ava Murphy’s goal with 3 minutes, which required an extra attacker.

The matchup was penalty filled. Ohio State had four, UW had five, including two that were almost back-to-back late in the first period. The Badgers survived the first despite struggling to get the puck out of their zone but not the second.

Senior Sloane Matthews’ power play goal with 31 seconds to go in the first period coupled with sophomore Jordyn Petrie’s unassisted goal at the 5:40 mark gave Ohio State all the scoring it would need.

The Badgers, who were outshot, 17-7, in the first period, flipped that total in the second but couldn’t get one through a Buckeyes defense that allows 1.68 goals per game.

“A couple bounces here or there could have changed the entire course of that game,” said senior Lacey Eden, who led UW with eight shots. “That’s just hockey and that’s how it goes sometimes. We definitely had our opportunities. It’s being able to capitalize on those, which is something that we want to focus on tomorrow.”

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But in order to do that the Badgers will have to match the energy of a chief rival.

The stakes are huge. A Wisconsin win puts it back in first with two series against fifth-place Minnesota State on Feb. 13-14 and seventh-place St Cloud State on Feb. 21-22.