On March 26, the Minnesota Frost returned to Xcel Energy Center to play their first game in St. Paul since Feb. 23. The Frost hosted the top team in the Professional Women’s Hockey League, the Montréal Victoire, who came ready to clinch their playoff spot in their 4–1 win over the Frost. Minnesota is left with the final four games of the season to try and maintain or improve their current fourth place standing in order to advance to the playoffs in May.
In the first period, the Frost struggled to set up a meaningful offensive push, with any potential shots on goal being stifled by whiffed passes to center ice and the physicality of Victoire defenders around the net, including a no-call cross check that knocked over Minnesota’s Denisa Křížová. Montréal’s leading scorer, forward Marie-Philip Poulin, put the Victoire on the board with a breakaway goal, exposing a lapse in puck control for the Frost.
“Being off 10 days, I didn’t think we were quite as sharp as I was hoping we were gonna be as far as connecting on one time passes and being able to get pucks in the net as quick as I would have liked, but we were battling,” Frost Head Coach Ken Klee said. “Our players played hard, they always do, so you gotta respect that.”
At times, the Frost tried to retaliate to Montréal’s physical game with checks into the boards and shoving, but not without it coming back to bite the Frost, as forward Brooke McQuigge was called for a two-minute minor interference in the first. With a mixture of good puck-clearing and the Victoire shooting wide left, the Frost withstood the Victoire extending their one point lead in the first period.
“When we show up to practice, you have to bring that mojo and swagger and act like you are scoring goals, and even if you aren’t? you still have to act that way. I think that’s something clearly that’s going to be a plan of emphasis for us, and hopefully we can show that on Sunday,” Frost forward Grace Zumwinkle said.
Despite much of the first period play being driven by the Frost offense, the Victoire started off scoring with effective defense and made their offensive pushes count, managing four shots on goal, only three less than the Frost.

The Victoire started the second off hot with forward Laura Stacey scoring 24 seconds into the period. Soon after, the Frost’s Kelly Pannek reciprocated, notching one past Victoire goalie Elaine Chuli with assists by Zumwinkle and McQuigge to keep the Frost in it 2–1.
With three minutes left, a potential third goal for Montréal was overturned for goalie interference, giving the Frost an opportunity to capitalize on.
After playing at the Victoire’s fast speed for much of the game, the Frost slowed it down during a mid-third period power play, but to no avail. Multiple puck trips across the blue line forced the Frost to regather in the neutral zone, limiting the number of shots on goal they were able to rack up.
“I think we’d like to create more chances, but I certainly liked that we kept them to 17 shots, but at the end of the day it’s about points and we gotta figure out ways to get points,” Klee said.
“Minnesota is a dangerous team on the power play and so we were able to keep them off the board, which helped us gain momentum back,” Victoire coach Kori Cheverie said.
Montréal forwards Poulin and Stacey wrapped up their excellent nights in the third, each putting one more in and assisting another, finalizing the score to 4–1. Stacey finished at the top of the stat sheet with two goals and two assists. Poulin followed right behind with two goals and one assist.
“It was a big game for us,” Poulin said. “We wanted to clinch that playoff spot, and that’s what we did, but we went one period at a time, one shift at a time, and everybody does the job.”
The Frost are back in St. Paul Sunday night to host Toronto and try to stay alive for the postseason with four games remaining in the season.
“I think the belief is in our locker room. I think we all understand that the last two games isn’t our best, and it’s not acceptable,” Zumwinkle said.