Penalties hurt, and game-breaking penalties kill.

The Harvard women's hockey team learned that lesson last Saturday in a 3-0 loss to Princeton at Princeton.

"We definitely let the officiating get to us," sophomore A.J. Mleczko said.

Mleczko was specifically referring to two Harvard goals that were wiped out by dubious penalties.

The first came in the middle of the opening stanza.

Princeton had taken an early 1-0 lead at the 17:14 mark on a fluke shot by Shari Seibert during a Harvard line change.

Several minutes later, controversy struck. Harvard had control of the puck in the Princeton zone, and after peppering Tiger goalie Liz Hill with a series of shots, senior co-captain Diana Clark found the net--or so the team thought. The referee behind the net immediately signaled no goal, contending that a Harvard player had entered the crease.

After a scoreless second period, the Tigers put the game away with two goals in a 4:11 span in the third to go up by three.

But the controversy didn't end.

Late in the game, a second Harvard goal--scored by A.J. Mleczko on a rebound of a shot from the point by junior Holly Leitzes--was erased by a tripping penalty called on junior Stacy Kellogg.

"[The officials] said I tripped a girl before the goal went in," Kellogg said. "They gave three different numbers to our coach [Kathy Stone] before they gave the penalty to me."

But the players acknowledged that the inconsistent calls weren't the only cause for the loss.

"We should have been able to play despite that," A.J. Mleczko said.

Harvard also had difficulty taking advantage of the power play, going 0-for-7 for the day.

"We had a hard time setting up in our offensive zone," Kellogg said.