With loss to New York Sirens, Toronto Sceptres start is looking more and more familiar

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The Toronto Sceptres fell to 1-3 on the year and currently occupy the basement in the six-team PWHL standings following a 4-2 loss to the New York Sirens.

The Sirens got goal scoring from all areas of their roster in this one, taking control of a scoreless game with four unanswered goals in the second period.

Two of those goals came with Toronto short-handed, one of them with the Sceptres playing two players short.

The penalty kill was one of Toronto’s strengths in Year 1 and like a few areas of their game, it is not right now, and will likely receive some extra attention between now and the Sceptres next game on Saturday when they play host to Montreal.

Here are the takeaways from what wasn’t so much a poor Toronto game as it was a poor period that cost them the night.

HERE WE GO AGAIN?

The last time and only second time the PWHL’s Toronto entry had lost three games in a row, it did so in last year’s playoffs after taking a 2-0 lead in a best-of-five semifinal series with Minnesota.

Minnesota would go on to reel off three wins in a row including a fifth and series deciding Game 5 on Toronto’s ice.

The first three-game losing streak was about this same point in the season when they dropped three in a row after splitting the first two of the year.

This time around it was consecutive losses to Minnesota at home and then Ottawa and New York on the road has at least a familiar feel to how last year started out.

The familiar feel is mostly about the goals against early on.

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Both last year and this the Sceptres have given up 14 goals in its first four games.

Through four games they have allowed a league high 14 this season and while Kristin Campbell was pulled in last night’s loss, this isn’t all on Toronto’s starting goaltender.

Defensively, the Sceptres just can’t seem to get out of their own way, or certainly their own end.

They are allowing opposing teams to continually hem them in for long periods of time not only tiring out defenders but allowing teams to pile up goal-scoring opportunities.

Now, granted it’s a small sample size just four games in. The team’s goal differential is minus-4, while the best in the league is a plus-4, belonging to the league-leading Sirens.

Which is an easy way to point out that the Sceptres are by no means buried.

But they will have to rely on that perseverance and togetherness that got them through some tough early times a year ago.

When the players talk about the learning points from Year 1 in the league, it was how important it was to stick together and remain focused on getting better rather than pointing fingers, as what got them on the road to that season-best winning streak.

That experience will put them in good shape for the coming couple of weeks as the Sceptres once again try to put these early struggles behind them.

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YOU HAVE TO LIKE THE FIGHT

Renata Fast and Jocelyne Larocque are not overly emotional players. Two steady defenders who have been in the situations that dwarf anything a regular season game even in the best women’s league in the world can present.

But neither is accustomed to losing much either and with their team down 4-1 in the third period and a Sirens defender pinching in and perhaps taking some liberties with rookie goalkeeper Raygan Kirk, the two had enough.

Fast made sure Allyson Simpson, the pinching Sirens defender wouldn’t get a second run at Kirk and that attracted the attention of Simpson’s teammates.

Jessie Eldridge and Abby Roque joined the fray with Larocque wisely quickly corralling Roque while Fast turned from Simpson to Paetyn Levis who wound up being taken down.

It was about as close as we have seen to a fight actually erupting in the PWHL. In the end nothing more transpired and officials took a player from each team off the ice to calm things down a little.

But it was the kind of response we have come to expect from two of Toronto’s leaders and it set the tone for a third period which the visitors actually won 2-0.

That win obviously doesn’t show up in the standings but it bodes well for a team looking to make steps in the right direction.

Mganter@postmedia.com