Montreal's Desbiens earns first PWHL shutout in victory over Ottawa

OTTAWA — Ann-Renee Desbiens posted the first shutout of her Professional Women's Hockey League career in Montreal's 2-0 win over host Ottawa on Saturday.

Desbiens, who backstopped Canada to a gold medal in the world championship final earlier this month, stopped all 28 shots she faced.

"It’s not so much the shutout as much as the win," said Desbiens. "If it helped us win, I’ll take it."

Laura Stacey and Maureen Murphy scored for Montreal (10-3-5-5), which already had a playoff spot secured in the PWHL's inaugural season.

Montreal's goal now with a game remaining in the regular season is to remain atop the regular-season standings and have home-ice advantage in the post-season.

Ottawa’s Emerance Maschmeyer, the No. 2 goalie on the Canadian team, turned away 21 shots.

A playoff spot remained in Ottawa’s (8-1-6-6) reach with two games remaining in its regular season. The top four teams among six make the PWHL playoffs.

Ottawa was tied for fourth with Boston, a 2-1 winner over No. 3. Minnesota on Saturday, but Ottawa has a game in hand on Boston

Ottawa's loss to Montreal in front of an announced 8,452 at TD Place in its final home game of the regular season snapped a four-game win streak for the host club.

Trailing 1-0, Ottawa came out flying in the third looking for the equalizer. They outshot Montreal 9-1 by the halfway mark of the period, but were unable to beat Desbiens.

Hayley Scamurra had two great chances in front and couldn’t beat a sprawled Desbiens.

“She’s a world class goalie and she kept her team in it today, particularly in the third,” Ottawa's coach Carla MacLeod said. "We had our chances though and today the puck didn’t go in, but that’s part of our world and sometimes that happens in a game.”

Ottawa's