It was no surprise the Western Collegiate Hockey Association duel at AMSOIL Arena Friday afternoon between the No. 8 University of Minnesota Duluth women's hockey team and No. 1 Ohio State University was a low-scoring affair. The only question after 60 minutes of play was which team was going to muster enough goals to win.

Friday's final score belonged to the Buckeyes, albeit barely, with the nation's top-ranked team etching out the slightest 2-1 win over the Bulldogs despite UMD outshooting the Buckeyes 34-27 in the contest and 20-7 in the third period. It was the type of drawn out affair both sides have become accustomed to in their battles of late.

"That's a really disappointing start for us at home coming off four big wins, a nice break, plenty of energy, the hype of the game and everything going into it," said UMD head coach Maura Crowell, whose Bulldogs have been dominant over OSU at home over her career. "To wait until halfway through the second period to really get our offense going was disappointing. I thought we were better than them for the last 30 minutes or so, we outshot them 20-7 in the third. It would have been nice had we shown up on time."

Neither team showed their offensive teeth in the first period, but OSU used its nation-best power play at 18:33 to take a 1-0 lead on a goal from Paetyn Levis.

The Buckeyes made it a 2-0 game at 15:57 of the second period on a goal from Emma Maltais, and after that, the Bulldogs appeared to flip an attacking switch.

UMD fought back in the third period, but it wasn't until the Bulldogs pulled goaltender Emma Soderberg with 3:28 remaining to pick up the extra skater that they finally got on the scoreboard.  Hanna Baskin walked the puck under the blueline left to right before finding Kylie Hanley at the top of the left circle. Hanley's wrist shot, coupled with Taylor Anderson's screen on OSU goaltender Raygan Kirk, beat Kirk over her left shoulder to pull the Bulldogs within a goal at 19:01. Despite a heavy action in front of the OSU goal for the ensuing minute, UMD couldn't complete the comeback in game one of the highly anticipated series.

Soderberg made 25 saves for the Bulldogs, while Kirk stopped 33 for the Buckeyes. UMD was scoreless in two power play attempts, although they struck with an extra skater late in the game, while OSU was 1-of-2 on its power play. The Buckeyes improve to 14-1-2 overall and 13-1-1 in WCHA play.

The Bulldogs (11-6, 5-6-) will look to Saturday afternoon at AMSOIL to try and equalize the series.  Game two gets underway at 3:00 p.m.

BULLDOG NOTES: For just the second time this season, UMD outshot its opponent and lost Friday … the Bulldogs also suffered a 4-3 setback to Wisconsin back on Oct. 29 despite outshooting the Badgers 38-26 in the skate …Friday was also the first time UMD had faced someone other than Amanda Thiele in net since Dec. 3, 2021 … Thiele came into that game in relief of a 5-2 Buckeye loss, and until Friday, had played six-straight games against UMD, including the NCAA title game … with the loss Friday, UMD is 2-3 against OSU in its last five home games and now 13-3-2 against the Buckeyes since the 2013-14 season … all-time, UMD owns a 73-26-9 all-time record.