Familiar foes will face off in the opener of this weekend’s AUS women’s hockey championship.

The Dalhousie Tigers and Saint Mary’s Huskies, who just played each other last Saturday, will meet again in the first quarter-final match of the conference tournament Friday afternoon.

Dal defeated SMU 3-1 in the Tigers’ regular-season finale on Feb. 28. It was the Tigers’ third win in four regular-season meetings against the Huskies.

The result actually didn’t have any effect on the AUS standings. The Tigers (12-11-1) had already clinched fourth in the conference while the Huskies (7-15-2) were entrenched in fifth. But Dal sophomore forward Robin Mullen said her team wanted to send a message.

"We wanted to tell them we were ready to play," said Mullen, a five-foot-eight forward from Weymouth, Digby, Co. "Our goal was to set the tone and set it early. I think we showed them what we’re all about. They (Saint Mary’s) will have to bring it if they want to beat us.

"We had a rough go in the second period in that game. We need to play a full 60 minutes if we want to be successful. If we can do that, they won’t be able to deal with us."

The Tigers are ranked fourth for the three-day conference championship at UPEI’s MacLauchlan Arena in Charlottetown. The Huskies are fifth.

"Saint Mary’s is a strong, physical team (who’ll) be hard on the forecheck," Mullen said. "We can’t give them any space. If we play like we can, we’ll be fine."

Dal and SMU will kick things off Friday at 4 p.m. followed by the third-ranked St. Thomas Tommies versus the No. 6 seed and host UPEI Panthers at 7 p.m.

The quarter-final winners will advance to the semifinals on Saturday and will face either the No. 1 Moncton Aigles Bleues and second-ranked St. Francis Xavier X-Men, who each had a quarter-final bye. Moncton will play the lowest remaining seed at 3 p.m. St. F.X. will take to the ice in the other semifinal at 6 p.m.

The championship is slated for Sunday at 2 p.m. The winner advances to the CIS championship in Antigonish in two weeks. If St. F.X. wins the Atlantic title, the runner-up will qualify for nationals.

Mullen said there’s even more incentive to making it to Sunday’s final.

"It’s a good feeling knowing that we could be two wins from the (CIS championship)," said Mullen, who scored 10 goals and 17 points during the regular season and played in all 24 games.

"But obviously we’re not looking past the quarter-finals. We won’t let up even if we make it to the final against St. F.X. Our goal is to get that (AUS) banner. We want to go as conference champion."

Things didn’t look too rosy for Dal after the team returned from the Christmas break. The Tigers won only twice in 10 games following the break.

But the Tigers found their scoring touch down the stretch and scored 20 goals in the final three regular-season games.

"We had a rough go after Christmas; but it did help build our chemistry," Mullen said. "As the season went on, we played better and it translated into wins."

( gmacdonald@herald.ca)

This page last modified Sunday, 07-Nov-2010 16:43:35 AST