Behind the Glass: Calgary Rising

It’s time for another installment of Behind the Glass — a weekly column collecting stories, trends, and thoughts from the wide world of professional women’s hockey.

• The Calgary Inferno have not lost a game since losing their season opener in Montréal. Since that loss on Oct. 13, the Inferno have out-scored their opponents — Les Canadiennes, the KRS Vanke Rays, and the Worcester Blades — by a margin of 25-1. The Inferno don’t play again until November 17 when they will face the 3-4-0-0 Toronto Furies.
• Calgary’s 9-0 steamrolling of the Blades on Oct. 28 was the most decisive win in the franchise’s history. Calgary out-shot Worcester 57-23 and their nine goals were spread out among nine different skaters./

“We played a very solid team game this weekend. We executed the systems and style of play that we want to be doing all year — so it was fun hockey to play for that reason ... We did the little things right, which gave us success in these two games.” -Kelty Apperson, Calgary Inferno

• Brianna Decker has scored the first goal of the game in three of Calgary’s six games this year. She’s now up to four goals in six games, which is undoubtedly impressive, but it still pales in comparison to the 11 goals she scored in her first six games of the 2014-15 CWHL season in Boston.
• The Blades are averaging 23.83 SF60 and 45.0 SA60 through the first six games of the 2018-19 season. For those who are curious: the Blades averaged 22.4 SF60 and 40.2 SA60 last season. And nope, goaltender Lauren Dahm still hasn’t started in a game./
• Les Canadiennes’ Emerance Maschmeyer posted back-to-back shutouts against the Toronto Furies last weekend, stopping all 38 shots she faced. Through six games she has a .956 save percentage — the highest among all CWHL goaltenders who have played over 100 minutes of hockey this year.
• A player on the Minnesota Whitecaps’ roster has earned Player of the Week honors in all three weekends that the team has played thus far. This time around it was goaltender Amanda Leveille, who posted a .957 save percentage in her two starts against the Buffalo Beauts. This season Leveille is 6-0-0 and has a .947 save percentage. She has to be the early favorite for the 2019 NWHL Goaltender of the Year./
• Katie McGovern has scored four goals in her first six NWHL games for the Whitecaps and Jonna Curtis has had the primary assist on each and every one of them. Thus far Curtis and McGovern have been one of the best offensive duos in the league, combining for eight goals in six games.
• Per Even-Strength.com, the Whitecaps have a 114 PDO (all strengths) and have out-scored their opponents 19-7 during 5-on-5 play despite being out-shot 87-119 when both teams have five skaters on the ice. Minnesota has scored first in all six of their games this season and has been buoyed by a 14.74 team shooting percentage. Last season, the Riveters led the NWHL with a 13.0 team shooting percentage.
• It took four games for opposing teams to shut down the dynamic duo of Hayley Scamurra and Maddie Elia. Buffalo’s 2-1 loss on Oct. 28 was the first time that Elia failed to score a goal in a game this season. Elia has a 36.4 shooting percentage through the first four games of the year; she had an 11.9 shooting percentage as a rookie in 2017-18.
• The Metropolitan Riveters were not assessed a single minor penalty in Boston on Saturday night. The Pride, on the other hand, were sent to the box four times and were on the short end of the stick with a few missed icing calls. Pride head coach Paul Mara shared some choice words with the officials after the game./
• Speaking of penalty minutes, Rebecca Russo has played in 43 NWHL regular season and playoff games without taking a single penalty. We very well could be witnessing the makings of a unique record that will stand for a very long time.
• Dani Cameranesi’s penalty shot goal scored against Leveille on Oct. 28 was the first penalty shot goal scored in a regular season NWHL game since Bray Ketchum beat Brianne McLaughlin on Feb. 21, 2016.
• Yelena Provorova, 16, scored more points than any other defender in  the Russian Women’s Hockey League in October. She recorded nine of her 11 points last month. Last season, Provorova recorded four points in 24 games with SKIF Nizhny Novgorod./

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Editor’s Note: a note about Ann Sophie Bettez closing in on the CWHL’s all-time scoring record has been removed due to inaccuracy. Per eliteprospects.com, Bettez is currently 94 points behind Caroline Ouellette’s scoring record.