AUBURN – An ice hockey coach couldn’t have designed a better power-play tip drill than that executed by two Mt. Blue field hockey forwards Monday afternoon.

After a long run up the right side, Michelle Oswald fired a shot through the circle toward Edward Little goaltender JoAnna Hughes. Just as Hughes tried to get a pad on the shot, Alyson Webster reached over and got a stick on the ball, sending it into the planks behind Hughes.

“Once I got to the corner of the field it was much easier,” said Oswald. “That play really works from the corner, and we work on it a lot in practice. That one, I think I was trying to put it into the net on its own, but worked out anyway.”

Webster’s goal, her first of two on the afternoon, provided enough offense to lead Mt. Blue (2-2) past Edward Little 2-0 at Sherwood Heights, thwarting a solid defensive effort by the Red Eddies.

“We can control a game, but we can’t put it in,” said Mt. Blue coach Jeannine Paradis. “That’s what I told the girls after the first half. You can control a game all you want, but all it takes is one travel up the field for the other team for them to either tie or take the game, so it was important for us to get one early in the second.”

The first half closely resembled a tennis match, with both teams firing the ball over midfield to the tops of the circles, but neither could muster offense of any kind.

“We were timid in the first half,” said EL coach Greg Perkins. “We talked about that, and how we needed more good hits. We got those in the second half, but not enough of them.”

Only once did Edward Little force Mt. Blue keeper Ashley Lewia to touch the ball in the first 30 minutes, while Hughes saw just three balls travel close to her goal line.

In the second, the Cougars’ luck appeared to stay the same. Just 30 seconds into the second frame, Webster rang the ball off the post. The ball danced across the goal line while the Mt. Blue bench tried to will the ball over the line.

It never crossed.

Webster’s tip-in came less than three minutes later, though, and put the Cougars ahead to stay. EL, while playing solid defense, couldn’t muster enough offensive pressure to draw even.

“They had great stick skills,” said Perkins. “They were stopping us at midfield all game. We had some offense, but not what we needed to.”

Webster’s second of the game came with less than 20 seconds to play on a flurry of activity in front of Hughes.