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Plays of the week: All hail Ann-Renée Desbiens

Ann Renée Desbiens, first of her name, of house Wisconsin, just did something no other goaltender did in the HISTORY of the NCAA. So yeah. Kind of a big deal.

There’s a lot of women’s hockey that deserves to be showcased, and we want to highlight the very best every week.

Each week, we’ll ask for you to send us the top plays you see in women’s hockey, whether they be from college games, pro games, international contests or anything in-between using the hashtag #TIGTop4 (It helps us a lot if you include pictures or GIFs of the play).

From the picks you send us, we’ll select our top four, and then it’s up to you to vote for the best women’s hockey play of the week on our Twitter. Here are the top plays after this week’s vote:

4. Poulin/Spooner 2-on-1

We saw history in this week’s #TIGTop4 vote- for the first time in Canada’s history, their  women’s hockey team finished in fourth place at something. No gold medal for you this time, Canada!

(hollow laughing)

ANYWAYS, even though it only ended up getting 12% of the vote this week, you can’t deny that this gorgeous 2-on-1 goal by Marie Philip Poulin and Natalie Spooner. Like, if you told me to pick two people from Team Canada I WOULDN’T want coming towards me on a 2-on-1, those are 100% the two I’d pick. If you give them any room, they’re going to capitalize, and that’s exactly what they did on this play.

3. “Knight Hop” Goal

We could’ve made all of the United State’s goals from the gold-medal game the voting options for this week, but alas, we tried to choose one to avoid bias (is it working?). This one, dubbed unofficially the “Knight Hop” goal actually went to Brianna Decker, who blasted the puck past Emerance Maschmeyer from the point. But Hilary Knight goes to the front of the net to screen her, and....well, you can see what happens.

Team USA should trademark the “Hilary Hop.” They’d make millions in merch. Actually, maybe we should do that....

2. Brittany Bugalski’s sprawling save

*blares trumpets* THANK YOU FOR MAKING THIS THE SECOND PICK THIS WEEK.

I feel like goalies never get enough credit for their incredible saves during the poll, and Bugalski started out waaaaaaay behind everyone before earning 26% of the vote for this remarkable save.

If Maine had gotten this shot off just a liiiiiittle bit earlier, it might have gone in. But Bugalski made sure that puck wasn’t going anywhere as she lunged from one side of the cage to the other to make a crucial stop.

1. Ann Renée Desbiens is literally The Best

In the history of the NCAA, no goaltender ever has had more than 43 shutouts in their college career. Never, full stop.

Until now.

Ann-Renée Desbiens, first of her name, long may she reign, has officially been crowned the Shutout Goddess. We’re not even close to the end of the 2016-17 season and she’s already tied and broken the shutout record (in the same weekend!) thanks to two perfect games against Bemidji State.

The goalie who held the record before she broke it? Noora Räty. Yeah, she’s in pretty good company.

Congrats, Desbiens. Let’s see how many more shutouts you can get to put the new record as far out of reach as possible.

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