Boston had to win its last game of the season in regulation to crack the PWHL playoffs, and with the score tied and just 1:20 left on the clock, it was B.C.-born defender Kaleigh Fratkin who fired a point shot that deflected off a Montreal player and found the back of the net.
Fratkin’s goal, her second of the season, stood up as the winner and sealed Boston’s place in the post-season. And tonight, Boston and Montreal meet again with even higher stakes, as their best-of-five playoff series gets underway at Place Bell.
Montreal comes in as the favourite, having finished six points ahead of Boston in the regular season, but these teams split their four head-to-head matchups, with two games going to overtime and all but one decided by a single goal. You can expect this series to be a doozy.
We turned to Fratkin, the author of the goal that got Boston here, and also the post-season player with the most regular-season penalty minutes — 26 in 24 games — to tee up what she’s certain will be a very physical series.
SPORTSNET: What was it like to score the game-winning goal to get your team into the playoffs?
FRATKIN: Yeah, that was pretty cool. Their forward was coming out to the point to try and block the shot, so I tried to shoot around her, and it went off one of their players. Their goalie [Ann-Marie] Desbiens wasn’t even, I feel like, properly in her angle. When I saw the puck go in, it took me a second to process that it actually went in. And then the crowd was insane, so the crowd erupted, and then everyone was skating towards me and I was like, “Oh, wow, that's a goal!” [Laughs.]
Every goal is certainly important, but that was truly an important one to keep the season going. I was just lucky it came off my stick. I would say as a defenceman, you’re never really pegged as a goal-scorer. It’s one of the cooler ones of my career, for sure.
And it came against Montreal. What sort of challenge does Montreal present to your team?
They’ve been a team that we’ve almost created a really physical and competitive rivalry with. We've played them four times this year, and there's already been heightened animosity that’s definitely brewing between us and them.
We got very physical. This past game it was back-and-forth, our team throws a hit and their team’s throwing a hit. I think that's the type of hockey that we really have to be prepared for. And they obviously have some key players, so just ensuring you’re aware when certain people are out on the ice. I think something, too, that we've started to do in the last four or five games is finding a way to put the puck in the net — like, we scored four against Montreal. They haven't always been pretty goals, but they've been finding the back of the net. That's something we definitely struggled with all season, but it’s happening now and it’s coming at the right time.
MORE FROM SPORTSNET
You mentioned the physicality in this matchup. How does that complement your game?
The physical side of it, I love. I grew up playing boys’ and men’s hockey, and it’s a piece of the game that I think has really made it exciting. I know for all us players, we're all talking about it. Everyone's talking about hits that people are throwing, and all out of competitiveness — no one’s trying to injure anyone, but it’s fun to bring out that side. I'm not afraid to get in the corner and throw the body, and for a number of reasons. I find that defensively you're able to shut down plays by doing that. And also, it helps get the team going and sets the tone, and I mean, that's important, especially when you get to this type of hockey at the end of the season, you definitely don't want to be shying away from the puck. So that's something I like [laughs].
We really started to see more of it in the last couple of games of the regular season, too, knowing how important those games were. It’s physical hockey and it’s only going to get more physical, just because everyone’s competitive and wants to win.
You hold the distinction of being the most penalized player taking part in the post season.
[Laughs.] No surprise, I guess.
Boston’s roster includes a lot of stars, but are there depth players you’re expecting to make a big impact in this series?
[Alina] Mueller has been a key player, she played centre the first half and then moved to the wing just to provide a different look to some of the lines. There’s Theresa Schafzahl, who’s a depth player on our team, and she makes elite plays. She made a great pass the other night to Mueller for a goal. We have players like Emily Brown, who’s a great stay-at-home defenceman and shows up big every single game. We had Lexie Adzija come over from Ottawa in a trade and she’s been good down the middle to provide depth at centre. Nicole Kosta stepped up for us in some big games — she doesn’t get a ton of ice time but does all the little things, and against New York, a key game we had to win, she had two points. Sophie Shirley, too, she's a dynamic player.
We obviously have our big names like Knighter [captain Hilary Knight] and [Megan] Keller and obviously Aerin [Frankel] on the back end, but there's also been some good supporting players that have definitely helped us have success in the last five games to get us here.
For a time, it looked like this team wouldn’t crack the playoffs, but you finished the season strong. How does that maybe alter the team’s confidence level?
We, as a group, know that for the majority of the season we've been underperforming. Not winning games we should’ve been winning, or games we thought we played glimpses of really good hockey, but we didn’t play for 60 minutes, we played for 40, so we didn’t end up with a win.
Everyone has high expectations and wants to be in the position that Toronto is going into the playoffs [as the top seed]. Those are all things that you want in your season and you'd expect out of the group that we have. But I think the biggest thing is that we all recognize where we have sat and where we should be and want to be. And I think we’ve seen a shift in energy recently, a shift in how people are showing up to the rink. So, I feel like we're coming together at a time when it’s a very important time to come together.
I just believe in the group. And we want to go all the way — we’re not looking to just have an appearance in the first round of the playoffs. We want to win.