NORTHFIELD, Vt. – As an inch of snow covered the ground early Saturday morning, the projected wintry mix was a cause for concern when it came to the playing conditions of the important GNAC matchup between Saint Joseph's (Maine) and Norwich on Howard Field. But the refs arrived, the players stayed warm, the fans did their best to stay dry, and in the end, the Norwich Cadets put on a solid 24-5 victory performance on their dedicated "Senior Day".

Scoring was produced by a slew of Cadets, but the juniors led the pack as Danielle Del Dotto scored five goals and Kacey Abbriano netted four goals and six assists for a career-best 10 points on the afternoon.

Freshmen Grace Fitzpatrick recorded four goals and one assist, while classmate Courtney Saheim netted a hat trick. Junior Suzanne Whitaker scored a pair, while classmates Lindsey Mathias netted one and Mollie Fitzpatrick tallied a goal and an assist.

In net, senior Kellie Pickel earned the win with 12 saves in 47 minutes of net time. Junior Meghan Kennedy came in to relieve her and made seven big saves in the remaining 13 minutes.

Alyssa Marchant and Emily Wight led the Monks in scoring with two goals apiece, as Anneka Adame scored one and Amelia Santos got credited for Saint Joseph's (Maine) two assists of the game.

Although the final score was a 19-point spread, the game was much closer in the stats, as Norwich only outshot the Monks 37-34 and picked up 30 ground balls to their 25. The Monks won 17-of-30 face-offs, but were only successful on 5-of-12 attempts.

The Cadets took full control of the home field advantage and netted three goals before the Monks answered back with one of their own. Another three goals added to the home team's score, and one more was tallied by the visitors midway through the first half.

By halftime, the Cadets were leading the Monks 14-3, already making use of the 10-point rule and running time to get through the cold weather conditions.

The Monks weren't able to find the back of the net for the first half of the second frame, but the Cadets kept tallying their goals, stretching the difference to an unrecoverable 21-3.

At 16:23, Wight tallied her second goal of the game to push the visitors to 4 points, but the Monks allowed another three-goal show to be put on by the Cadets before Saint Joseph's Marchant closed out the game with a goal with 0.08 seconds remaining on the clock.

In net for the Monks, Taylor Allison faced the loss but made six saves in the game. Haley Nason came in with 18:31 remaining on the clock, and set aside two shots on goal.

Norwich will be hosting Mount Ida College in the make-up conference game on Monday at 4 p.m. on Howard Field. This game will wrap up the GNAC regular season and the playoff bracket for the week should be released by Tuesday afternoon.

-CADETS-