Two seasons ago, the Ohio State Buckeyes Women’s Hockey team reached its first-ever Frozen Four. Led by star goaltender Kassidy Sauve, the Buckeyes fell 1-0 in overtime to eventual National Champion Clarkson.
Following the season, Sauve transferred (to Clarkson, ironically enough) and the Buckeyes were not quite at that elite level last year. Head coach Nadine Muzerall has built a strong program, one that was successful even without the best goaltender in program history. The Buckeyes were a Top 10 team last year, but just missed out on a bid to the NCAA tournament.
Ohio State ended its season with a 3-2 loss to Wisconsin in the WCHA Championship Game. The Badgers would go on to win the National Championship.
This weekend, Ohio State hosts Wisconsin in their first matchup since then end of last season. The Buckeyes started this year at 4-0 and are led by a potent offense that has seen four different players already notch multi-score games. The Badgers, meanwhile, also have multiple dangerous scoring options, and will be a big test for Ohio State.
The Badgers enter the two-game season as the unanimous No. 1 team in the country. This is the first real chance for Muzerall’s Buckeyes to show that they’re ready to compete at a national level in 2019-2020. If Ohio State can even earn a split, the entire country will have to watch out for the Buckeyes this year. The road to a National Championship will almost certainly go through the Badgers, and Ohio State gets the first real shot at them.
