Ottawa Charge upsets top-seeded Montreal Victoire in team’s first PWHL playoff game

Ottawa Charge’s Rebecca Leslie (37) gets tangled with Montreal Victoire goaltender Ann-Renee Desbiens (35) during second period PWHL playoff hockey action in Laval, Que., on May 8, 2025. Photo by Christinne Muschi /The Canadian PressArticle content

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The Charge lost a couple of early one-goal leads in its first PWHL playoff game, but then held on to the only one that mattered.

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Shiann Darkangelo’s wrist shot from the top of the right faceoff circle at 9:17 of the third period stood as the winner as the Charge grabbed command of its best-of-five opening round series with a 3-2 victory over the Montreal Victoire at Place Bell in Laval.

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Darkangelo, who had three goals and four assists in Ottawa’s last five regular-season games, continued her hot run when she took a short pass from Emily Clark before finding the mesh behind Montreal goalie Anne-Renee Desbiens.

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Also starring for Ottawa was rookie goalie Gwyneth Philips, who stopped 31 shots while her teammates directed 27 pucks at Desbiens.

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The Victoire finished the regular season in first place and with that, chose the third-place Charge as its first round opponent rather than the defending Walter Cup champion Minnesota Frost, which finished in fourth.

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Brianne Jenner and Ashton Bell had Charge’s other goals while Maureen Murphy and Marie-Philip Poulin scored for the Victoire.

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Jenner opened the scoring for Ottawa with a power-play goal at the 4:54 mark of the first period, but Murphy replied with the Charge shorthanded a little more than seven minutes later and the teams went to the intermission deadlocked.

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Bell, whose three regular-season goals were all scored against Montreal, put the Charge ahead again when she snuck in from the blue line and fired a high shot into the back of the net after a scramble in front at the 5:07 make of the middle frame.

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But again, the Victoire knotted the count on the power play a little more than two minutes later when Poulin found the short side with a one-timer.

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The Victoire lost Catherine Dubois, who has scored in each of the team’s final three games, with an apparent hand injury in the first period. She did not return,

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Game 2 goes Sunday afternoon (2 p.m.) at Place Bell before the series moves to Ottawa for Game 3 Tuesday at 7 p.m.

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