Alexa Vasko helps Ottawa Charge beat Minnesota Frost 3-2 to 'win one for Masch'

Under difficult circumstances, the Ottawa Charge found a way to collect three crucial points on Tuesday night.

Ottawa's Alexa Vasko scored a late short-handed goal to lift the Charge to a 3-2 Professional Women's Hockey League victory over the Minnesota Frost.

Ottawa (8-1-4-9) had controlled momentum for much of the game, but then things changed in the third period in an instant.

Holding a 2-1 lead, the Charge struggled as they watched their star goaltender Emerance Maschmeyer leave the game being held up by team trainers.

Maschmeyer has been the Charge's best player since the team launched operations last season and seeing her leave under duress was difficult. There was no update on her status following the game.

Just moments earlier Maschmeyer had been given a standing ovation for making her 1,000th regular-season career save.

Just as the applause ended Taylor Heise got a shot through traffic to cut Ottawa's lead in half and make it 2-1.

At first glance it looked like Maschmeyer made a rather innocuous save, but silence fell as the 30-year-old was unable to get up on her own and needed to be helped off the ice.

Gwyneth Philips came in with 9:55 remaining and gave up a goal on the first shot she faced. It was initially called off, but a lengthy review proved otherwise and suddenly the game was tied 2-2.

"We said we've got to do this together," said Ottawa coach Carla MacLeod. "There's all kinds of variables constantly being tossed at us, and that was another one... it's certainly a moment that you just try and rally the girls and say `hey, let's go get this one for Masch', and that's exactly what the team did."

Things were made more difficult when Shiann Darkangelo was assessed a tripping penalty with 5:48 remaining,