ROCHESTER, NY – The RIT women's hockey team (10-17-3, 4-11-1 CHA) fell for the second straight day to College Hockey America leader Mercyhurst (20-7-3, 11-4-1 CHA) at the Gene Polisseni Center on "Check Your Pucks" day.

RIT honored fifth-year student manager Joe, better known as "Part Time Joe". RIT wore special jerseys that were auctioned off during the game with proceeds going to the Testicular Cancer Foundation of Western New York, which Vicario founded and the Lipson Cancer Center at Rochester General Hospital through the RIT United Way Foundation. Visit http://www.tcafofwny.org/ for more information.

Vicario, who suffers from Goldenhar Syndrome and is a testicular cancer survivor, is imploring men to "Check Your Pucks" which was the theme on Saturday.

Emily Janiga scored a pair of goals to lead the Lakers, while Paige Horton also scored. In goal, Julia DiTondo recorded her first collegiate shutout, stopping all 20 shots she faced.

Mercyhurst out-shot RIT, 33-20. RIT was 0-for-6 with the man-advantage, while Mercyhurst was 1-for-4.

RIT goaltender Ali Binnington (Oakville, Ontario/Mississauga Chiefs) was excellent in goal, stopping 30 of 32 shots, including several highlight reel saves. Mercyhurst also hit four posts. Kolbee McCrea (Wawa, Ontario/Burlington Barracudas) had a great chancein the second period, as she shoveled a puck past DiTondo, but the referees blew the play dead. The RIT bench asked for a video review, but did not receive one.

"Ali (Binnington) gave us a chance to win today," said RIT head coach Scott McDonald. "I was disappointed they (the officials) did not review what I thought was a second period goal for us, that may have made a huge difference. Going forward from there, we played hard, but could not get the big goal."

Mercyhurst got on the board with two first period goals before the contest was 10 minutes old. At the 3:47 mark, Janiga stole a pass in the neutral zone, skated in and beat Binnington with a backhander from in close for her 23rd goal of the season to open the scoring.

At the 9:41 mark, Horton made it a 2-0 game, firing a shot from the slot on a power-play that deflected off a RIT defender and in for her second goal of the season.
Celeste Brown (Great Falls, MT/National Sports Academy) had a partial breakaway in the second period, but was hauled down, resulting in a penalty.

The Tigers pressed on in the third period, but could not get one past DiTondo. Janiga put the game away in the final minute with an empty-netter.

Mercyhurst leads the all-time series between the two schools, 11-2 and finished the regular season series, 4-0 in 2014-15. Yesterday, the Lakers upended RIT 5-1 at the Polisseni Center. McCrea scored RIT's lone goal. Earlier in the season, Mercyhurst won the first two meetings of the season by identical 4-1 scores on Nov. 21-22.

The Tigers are back in action next weekend with a pair of games at CHA foe Robert Morris. Friday's game starts at 7:05 p.m., while Saturday's begins at 3:05 p.m.