After a long stretch of idling in the cold, it may take a few games for the No. 7 Harvard women’s hockey team to get its engine started.

The Crimson certainly did not seem to be in top gear against Dartmouth on Monday night when the Big Green overwhelmed it, dealing Harvard an important ECAC loss on Monday.

The Crimson (10-7-2, 7-3-2 ECAC) dropped the contest on the road in Hanover by a score of 3-1 to Dartmouth (9-8-2, 6-5-1), hurting its already-tenuous position on the cusp of the top eight teams in the country.

While the Big Green has been inconsistent all season, Harvard had held a four-game win streak against Dartmouth and hoped to gain more momentum in the ECAC.

“Three weeks away from competitive hockey was tough,” captain Carrie Schroyer said. “But there are no excuses.

“That first period was rough,” she added.

Big Green coach Mark Hudak did not start gaoltender Kate Lane, who had been tagged with the loss the last time the two teams faced-off, and instead went with freshman netminder Carli Clemis.

Clemis stopped 22 shots in goal, including 12 in the first period, to keep the Crimson off of the scoreboard and allow Dartmouth to jump out to a quick lead on Shannon Bowman’s ninth goal of the season.

“We are not really concerned with the other team’s look and we try to go into a game prepared to play our game,” Schroyer said. “I didn’t even know until after the game that she wasn’t their number one goalie.”

During the key first period, Clemis also stopped all 10 attempts that Harvard managed on its four powerplays. The Crimson special teams unit had been the second best in the nation entering Monday night’s contest.

The final one-man advantage of the period for Harvard did lead to a tally in the beginning of the next frame, but the goal proved to be too little in the face of the Big Green’s rolling offense.

“Dartmouth did a really nice job defending our power play,” said Harvard coach Katey Stone.

“We were fortunate to get a lot of calls in our favor, but Dartmouth did a really good job of blocking our shots,” Schroyer said. “We didn’t come close to getting it going until that goal by Katie Johnston.”

The game-winner came just two minutes after junior forward Katie Johnston tied the score in the second period.

Maggie Kennedy received a cross-ice pass while on the powerplay and quickly sent the puck on net to beat Harvard senior goalie Ali Boe.

Dartmouth’s Julia Bronson added another goal midway through the final frame when she deflected the puck into the Crimson net.

Down the stretch, Harvard never managed to get its momentum going, partly due to its penalty situation—the Crimson had five infractions in the final two periods, compared to none by the Big Green.

An additional hindrance to Harvard, besides the time off, was a contagious illness that kept sophomore Jessica MacKenzie out of the Dartmouth contest.

The Crimson hopes to be back in full swing and healthy for the weekend slate of Ivy rival matchups when it takes on Brown and Yale at home.

—Staff writer Gabriel M. Velez can be reached at gmvelez@fas.harvard.edu.