CAMBRIDGE, Mass. – Harvard women's hockey will be back in action this weekend as it hits the road for another pair of ECAC challenges. The Crimson (4-3-1, 2-3-1 ECAC) will take on No. 10 Yale (5-2-0, 2-2-0 ECAC) and No. 13 Brown (5-2-1, 1-2-1 ECAC) on the road as the team continues its ECAC conference season. Harvard will look to ride the momentum from its victory over Dartmouth into the ranked matchups this weekend.  
 

Last Time Out

In a home-and-home series with the Dartmouth Big Green, Harvard continued to perform well and eventually came away with 4.5 out of a potential six points on the weekend. The Crimson first grabbed a point-and-a-half after a hard-fought tie in the Friday matchup thanks to a goal from Angelica Megdanis and a 21-save effort from Izzy Whynot.
 
In the Saturday matchup, three different Harvard skaters potted goals to lift the team to a 3-0 win over the ECAC and Ivy League rival. Elle Sproule scored her first career goal in the contest and Emily Davidson backed the effort with a 27-save shutout. The senior netminder secure her second shutout of the season and third career to anchor the Harvard defense.
 

Series History Against Brown and Yale

The Crimson and the Bulldogs will compete for the 93^rd time in series history when they meet on the ice this weekend. Harvard owns a considerable advantage in the all-time series with an 80-16-6 record dating back to the 1978-79 season. The Bulldogs have fought back in recent years and own an 8-2-0 record in the last 10 meetings. Last season, Harvard upset the No. 15 Bulldogs in a 5-1 victory during the teams' first matchup.
 
Harvard and Brown have crossed paths on the ice 97 times in series history as the Crimson lead the all-time series 53-37-7. Harvard is looking for its first win over the Bears since the 2021-22 season.
 

Player History Against Brown and Yale

Six skaters own points in their careers against Yale, with Gwyn Lapp leading the way with two goals and one assist. Scout Oudemool and Antonina Dinges both scored goals to contribute to the upset win over No. 15 Yale last season. Emily Davidson is 1-1-0 in her career against Yale, posting a 2.00 GAA and a .942 save percentage (65-for-69).
 
Lapp also leads the team in career points against the Bears with two goals against the foe. Ella Lucia, Kaley MacDonald and Kate Kasica all have posted assists in the series. Davidson (0-2-0, 4.00 GAA, .889 SV) and Tuffy (0-1-0, 2 GA, 44 Saves) have started games against the Bears in their careers.  
 

Scouting the Bulldogs

The No. 10 Yale Bulldogs come into the contest against the Crimson with a record of 5-2-0 and 2-2-0 in ECAC conference play. Yale opened the season with a two-game sweep of Robert Morris before splitting its first two ECAC series. In its opening weekend slate, Yale defeated Princeton, 4-3, in overtime after a 3-1 loss to Quinnipiac. The week after, the Bulldogs dropped a contest to Cornell before defeating Colgate, 5-4, also in overtime.
 
As a team, the Bulldogs boast an offense that puts up 3.0 goals per game and is backed up by a defense that allows just 2.1 goals per game. On special teams, Yale's powerplay has gone 3-for-21 on the year for a .143 percentage and it's penalty kill has gone 14-for-18 at a .772 clip. Nationally, Yale ranks in the top ten in faceoff percentage (.565, 8^th) and scoring margin (.86, 10^th).
 
Senior forward Carina DiAntonio leads the team in points with nine off seven goals and two assists. Her classmate, Jordan Ray, is close behind with one goal and seven assists, which hare a team best. Junior goaltender Anna Phillips has emerged as the leader for the Bulldogs between the pipes, posting a 1.30 GAA and .944 save percentage in five games this season.
 

Scouting the Bears

Brown has gotten off to another strong start in 2025-26, rising to the No. 13 spot in the USCHO poll entering the matchup with the Crimson this weekend. Wins over No. 13 Boston University (Oct. 17), No. 7 Quinnipiac (Oct. 25), and Delaware (No. 8-9) have highlighted the early success for Brown.
 
The Bears own the nation's 10^th best scoring defense, allowing just 1.88 goals per game through the first four weeks of its season. In the offensive end, Brown is coring 2.0 goals per game and own a powerplay clip of 19-percent (5-for-26). The Bears are also in the national top ten in faceoff win percentage with its 55.7-percent winning clip on the dot.
 
Junior Margot Norehead and senior India McDadi lead the team with seven points each and six other Bears skaters own two or more points entering the weekend. Rory Edwards has led the goaltending effort, posting a .918 save percentage and 2.31 GAA in six starts. Backup goaltender, Anya Zupkofska, has posted shutouts in both her starts, making 31 saves across the two games.
 

Whynot Izzy?

For the second consecutive week, Izzy Whynot has been named the ECAC Bitcoin Rookie of the Week. Another strong effort in net this past weekend earned Whynot the honor. Whynot becomes the first Crimson skater to earn back-to-back ECAC Rookie of the week nods since Jillian Dempsey '13 in the 2009-10 season.
 
After posting a shutout in her first career win two weeks ago, Whynot followed up the effort with another strong start against the Dartmouth Big Green. In a 65-minute overtime contest, Whynot made 21 saves – including five on the penalty kill – and allowed only one goal in an eventual tie with the Big Green. In her first three collegiate starts, Whynot has only allowed six goals for a 1.96 GAA and saved 82 shots for a .932 save percentage. In two of those starts, the Canadian netminder has allowed one or fewer goals, making her the first rookie goaltender to accomplish the feat for the Crimson since Linday Reed in the 2018-19 season.
 

Megdanis Leading the Way

After eight games, junior forward Angelica Megdanis holds the team lead in points with six on the season. The Connecticut native has posted three goals and three assists – which are already both career season highs – to lead the Crimson offense. Megdanis scored twice in the opening weekend sweep of Saint Michael's (Oct. 17) and UNH (Oct. 18) and recently got on the board in the first matchup against Dartmouth (Nov. 7) last weekend.
 

Locking Down the Net

Through eight contests, Harvard has allowed only 1.75 goals per game to its opponents, the seventh-lowest in the nation and third-lowest in the ECAC. The Crimson has allowed two or fewer goals in six games this season including three shutouts against Saint Michael's (Oct. 17), St. Lawrence (Nov. 1) and Dartmouth (Nov. 8). The combination of a relentless defense – that has blocked 93 shots on the season – and a steady goaltending effort has helped Harvard shut down opponents regularly this season.
 

Blocking Shots

A staple of Harvard's defensive success in the Bellamy era has been getting into shooting lanes and blocking shots. The team set a program record with 536 blocked shots a year ago and has continued to make an effort in that area this year, posting 93 in six games.
 
First-year defender, Bella Finnegan, leads the effort with 14 blocks with Emi Biotti, Kaley MacDonald and Scour Oudemool one her heels with 13 blocked shots each.
 

Minding the Net

One of the Crimson's biggest strengths this season has been its goaltending trio of Emily Davidson, Ainsley Tuffy and Izzy Whynot. The group has combined to post a .941 save percentage and a 1.73 GAA in eight games which are eighth and seventh best in the NCAA, respectively. Davidson owns a 2-1-0 record in three starts this year and has posted a 1.67 GAA and .932 save percentage which puts her in 13^th and 20^th in the nation, respectively.
 
The national leader in rookie GAA, Izzy Whynot owns a 1.96 average after her first three career starts. The Canadian first year owns a record of 1-1-1 in her first three games this season and owns a .932 save percentage which is T20 in the nation and second best among rookie goaltender in the NCAA.
Ainsley Tuffy has also looked sharp in her first two starts this season, allowing only three goals and posting a .961 save percentage in two games. The Massachusetts native led the team to victory in the opening weekend triumph over UNH and allowed just two goals to No. 9 Clarkson on the road in the contest two weeks ago. Her save percentage and GAA would both be in the top-five nationally is she qualified statistically (33-percent of a team's minutes played).
 

Down a Player, Up for the Challenge

Harvard's penalty kill has been a force this season, allowing just two goals on 23 penalties this season for a .913 percentage. The PK clip is the seventh best in the nation and second best in the ECAC at this point in the season. Harvard opened the season by killing off its first seven penalties and currently find themselves on a 14-kill streak dating back to its matchup with Clarkson (Oct. 31).  
 

First-Years at the Front

Harvard's top line of Morgan McGathey, Carla McSweeney and Elle Sproule have been playing together for the past three weekends and recently posted its best performance of the season against Dartmouth last Saturday (Nov. 8). The group scored two of the team's three goals to lift the team to victory against the Big Green.
 
Sproule tipped in a shot from the point to notch her first career goal in the first period of the contest while Carla McSweeney provided some insurance with a goal off a rebound late in the second period. Sproule and McGathey had each of the assist on the McSweeney tally.
 

Up Next

After the games this weekend, Harvard will have the weekend of Nov. 21-22 off before hosting the University of Maine for a two-game set on Thanksgiving Weekend. The Crimson will welcome the Black Bears to the Bright-Landry Hockey Center on Nov. 28-29. Both games are scheduled for a 3:00 PM puck drop with all the action streaming live on ESPN+.