The Professional Women’s Hockey League does not yet have its record book, and no matter when it appears, there is a good chance that Erin Ambrose’s name will be listed under the category of “greatest number of minutes played in a playoff game. By then, the Montreal team defender will perhaps have fully realized the full extent of what she experienced at Place Bell on Saturday evening. Monday noon, this was not yet the case.
“Not quite,” Ambrose admitted when asked the question after the team’s training session at the Verdun Auditorium.
“I also couldn’t realize that we went to the third overtime (Saturday) with so many chances [de marquer] from either side. “It’s something I’ve never experienced before and probably never will again,” she added.
During a playoff game that lasted more than 111 minutes against the Boston team, Ambrose played for 61 minutes and 33 seconds, no less, in a heartbreaking 2-1 defeat, the second in as many years. extra time matches for Kori Cheverie’s squad.
Thus, Montreal is down 0-2 in the semi-final series three of five and will face elimination Tuesday evening in game three, at the Tsongas Center, in Lowell.
For Ambrose and her teammates, all attention is now focused on this duel with no future. However, the media still wanted to know how Ambrose felt about 36 hours after a 4:47 marathon. And most importantly, how his day went on Sunday.
“A lot of recovery. Alternating hot and cold baths. Whatever it took to make my body feel good today,” summed up Ambrose, who seemed utterly energized when she met with the media, even going so far as to sprinkle some of her responses with nice touches of ‘humor.
Her little side as an actress appeared when she was asked if she was more tired, physically, than drained, mentally after Saturday’s meeting.
“I would say it was a bit of both. I think I felt a kind of fog, and of course, disappointment [de la défaite] didn’t help either. I think the hardest part was that I wore high heels, and I had to walk out of the arena in my high heels! It’s not something I wanted to do, not at all! I probably should have just gone out in my flip flops! »
Her sense of humor appeared a second time when she noted that she had rehydrated a lot but that she had also walked a lot on Sunday.
” To walk ? ”, she was asked.
“If I had stayed lying on the couch, I don’t think I could stand upright today! ”, she replied.
Marie-Philip Poulin, who spent a little more than 50 minutes on the ice Saturday, said she slept a lot on Sunday and took an ice bath.
“That one was different,” admitted the captain when talking about her day after the match.
” It’s sure that [le match] ran into us. It’s part of the series and we are ready to return to Boston,” she took the trouble to add.
Furthermore, Laura Stacey, one of the three other Montreal players to have played for more than 50 minutes on Saturday, did not participate in Monday’s training, nor did goalkeeper Ann-Renée Desbiens.
Nothing suggests, according to Cheverie, that one or the other of these two pillars of the Montreal club — or both — is injured.
Win a match, three times
At first glance, the mission of Cheverie and her players is to attack a mountain that they still have to climb from base to top.
To achieve this objective, the players of the Montreal club want to reduce the task awaiting them with segments as short as possible.
“We don’t need to win three games; we have to win a match, three times,” Ambrose illustrated.
“It starts with game number three. It may sound like a cliché, but that’s what we focus on. It will be one presence at a time. It starts in the first half tomorrow by making sure we come out on fire, with combativeness. »
Kristin O’Neill, who has scored her team’s only two goals so far, maintains that the Montreal club has nothing to lose at the current stage.
“In a different way, it’s a great position to be in.” We can kind of play with emotion and focus on the present moment. »
Cheverie sees things the same way as O’Neill.
“I think a lot of people would agree that we could be up 2-0 in this series. I like the fact that we are going abroad and we have nothing to lose. We are already behind 2-0. The girls in the locker room know they have to give it their all,” Cheverie said.
“We played about nine periods and I would say we dominated seven of them. We have to go game by game, period by period, on the road, in a situation where, you know what, we have a great opportunity to take over. momentum. »
On the Boston side, head coach Courtney Kessel announced that Jamie Lee Rattray will be back in the lineup. Rattray was injured in the final game of the season against Montreal and missed the first two games of the series.
Kessel also indicated that the message to her players was not changing.
” We know that [Montréal] will show up and fight. This is a team that never gives up, no matter if they are down 2-0 in the series. We’re going to have to show speed, play tough and continue to do the things that have brought us success. We will have to gain momentum quickly in the match. »