University of Maine women’s hockey player Daria Tereshkina has been suspended for one game by Hockey East as the result of a hit from behind on an opponent during the second period of the Black Bears’ 2-1 loss to Quinnipiac on Sept. 29 in Orono.
The freshman center from Chelyabinsk, Russia, will miss Friday night’s game at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute of Troy, New York, but will be eligible to play in Saturday’s contest.
Officials did not call a penalty on the play, but Hockey East associate commissioner Brian Smith said a tape of the game was reviewed by commissioner Joe Bertagna and supervisor of officials Dave Lezenski and it was decided that the suspension was warranted.
“(Tereshkina) hit (a Quinnipiac player) hard into the boards. She should have been thrown out of the game. But the referees didn’t see it,” said Smith, who noted that the Quinnipiac player wasn’t injured on the play.
He explained that Tereshkina could have received a game misconduct or game disqualification to go with a five-minute major if the referees had seen it.
A game misconduct would have enabled Tereshkina to play the following night, but a game disqualification would have meant that she would have been suspended for the next game.
Had she received a game disqualification and been suspended for the next game, a 4-2 UMaine win over Quinnipiac on Saturday, Smith said the league would not have taken further action.