Laura Stacey learns from experience in Victoire’s win over Torrent

By Canadian Press on March 20, 2026.

LAVAL — Laura Stacey returned to the dressing room searching for answers.

Some advice from her teammates — including goalie Ann-Renée Desbiens — helped her solve the problem.

After coming up empty on a first-period breakaway, the Montreal Victoire forward didn’t waste her second chance, outwaiting Seattle Torrent netminder Hannah Murphy for a back-breaking short-handed goal in the second period of her team’s 4-1 win Thursday.

“I got back to the locker room, and all the girls told me to be a little more patient, so that was a little bit in my head,” Stacey said. “I talked to Ann too, and she gave me a few pointers or just thoughts on Murphy, so that helped.

“I tried something different, to be honest, and I’m happy it went in. I was a bit scared I waited too long, but it all worked out.”

Stepping up without injured captain Marie-Philip Poulin, Stacey stripped the puck off defender Aneta Tejralová before cruising around the blue paint and roofing a shot into the gaping net as the 10,033 in attendance roared at Place Bell.

“They got a little break there, and got the wrong person bearing down (on us) with Laura,” Torrent head coach Steve O’Rourke said.

Stacey — Poulin’s wife and one of Montreal’s three foundational players — also set up Catherine Dubois’s opening goal in the first period, wrapping around the net on her backhand before handing her linemate a tap-in.

The powerful, five-foot-10 winger later iced the game with an empty-netter, applying yet another lesson.

In Sunday’s 4-3 overtime loss to Boston, the Fleet scored twice with the goalie pulled and erased Montreal’s three-goal lead — with Stacey icing the puck twice in an attempt to score from distance.

On Thursday, the 30-year-old from Kleinburg, Ont., skated down the ice and deep into the offensive zone before hammering a no-doubter into the empty cage.

“I thought Laura was going to end up in the net with the puck because she was so worried about missing,” Victoire coach Kori Cheverie said. “We were all laughing on the bench.”

Cheverie explained that even her players were asking to review video of the team’s 5-on-6 play following Sunday’s collapse.

“We talked a lot about that, and I definitely had some errors in the last 5-on-6 that I saw a couple times on video,” added Stacey, who scored her fifth of the season in a snake-bitten campaign. “We knew it was a pretty devastating loss for us, but we all said it’s better to happen then than later in the season, we learned from it and I think that’s exactly what we did.”

The Victoire (10-4-1-5) tied the league-leading Minnesota Frost and Boston with 39 points atop the PWHL standings with Thursday’s win. They head out on a two-game road trip, starting with a neutral-site game against the Ottawa Charge in Winnipeg on Sunday. Montreal then visits the Minnesota Frost on Wednesday.

Whether Poulin, defender Erin Ambrose or forward Maureen Murphy board the plane Friday was still to be determined, according to Cheverie.

Poulin missed the game with a lower-body injury after exiting Sunday’s loss following a hit from forward Shay Maloney, favouring the same right leg she hurt during preliminary-round play against Czechia at the Milan Cortina Olympics.

Ambrose hasn’t played since sustaining a lower-body injury late in the third period of Canada’s loss to the United States in the Feb. 19 Olympic gold-medal game. Murphy, meanwhile, exited in distress Thursday from a hit by Theresa Schafzahl late in the second period.

“We don’t have an update on our travelling roster exactly,” Cheverie said. “There’s always a possibility that a player can maybe not start with us, but maybe join us halfway through.”

In the meantime, the Victoire know they’ll have Stacey to lean on.

“She puts in the work every single day, so she just continues to get better and better and I think that that’s what has been created by our leaders in Montreal,” Cheverie said. “Stace is going to be that positive, vocal, lead-by-experience type of leader on the ice, and she uplifts everybody else.

“When there’s no quit in her game, I think that helps everybody rally as well, and I thought we saw a lot of really great versions of our players tonight.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published March 20, 2026.

Daniel Rainbird, The Canadian Press