Minnesota closes out PWHL regular season with fifth straight defeat

ELMONT, N.Y. — And the wait continues.

Needing just one point to clinch third place and a postseason berth in the inaugural Professional Women's Hockey League season, Minnesota saw host New York get two goals from Jaime Bourbonnais and score three times on the power play for a 5-2 victory Saturday afternoon in front of a crowd of 1,563 at UBS Arena.

Minnesota (8-4-3-9, 35 points), which has lost a season-high five straight games since returning from the nearly month-long International break, can still qualify for the four-team playoffs as long as Ottawa does not beat top-seeded Toronto in regulation on Sunday. Boston (8-4-3-9, 35 points) defeated Montreal, 4-3, on Saturday afternoon to join Toronto and Montreal in the playoffs. Boston owns the tiebreaker on Minnesota

Bourbonnais and Ella Shelton gave the home team a 2-0 lead early in the first period before Minnesota's Denisa Krizova closed the gap to 2-1 after the first 20 minutes. Shelton also finished with two assists for New York (5-4-3-12, 26 points).

The home team went up 4-1 after two periods thanks to power-play goals from Bouronnais and Jade Downie-Landry.

Grace Zumwinkle narrowed Minnesota's deficit to 4-2 early in the third period before Abby Rogue put the game away nearly halfway through the period with another power-play goal.

Kelly Pannek assisted on both of Minnesota's goals.

Lindsey Post made 28 saves in goal for New York in her first career start. Nicole Hensley stopped 26 shots for Minnesota.

Each team finished with 32 shots on goal.