Furies split opening weekend games against Boston

The Toronto Furies began their season on the weekend against the defending Clarkson Cup champion Boston Blades in Toronto.

The Furies started the season off strong, with Alyssa Bladin opening the scoring on Genevieve Lacasse, followed by a big goal from the Furies' 2015 first round pick Emily Fulton.

Throughout the game, the Furies continued to put pressure on Lacasse, who stopped 45 of 47 shots.

Christina Kessler got her first shutout of the season, stopping all 36 shots from the Blades offense.

Emily Fulton took the first star, with Christina Kessler earning the second, and Alyssa Bladin gaining the third.

With game one over, the two teams shifted their focus to game two the following day.

The Blades evened the weekend rivalry, winning 2-1 in a shootout. Elizabeth Tremblay opened the scoring for Boston to make it 1-0.

Toronto knew they had to respond, and that's exactly what Jessica Vella did just minutes after Boston drew first blood.

After no more goals had been scored during regular play the teams then went to a shootout where Kristina Brown earned the game winner for Boston in the third round of shooters.

Both goalies had another impressive performance, with Kessler stopping 25 of 26 shots faces, and Lacasse stopping 40 of 41.

Kessler said in an online press release: "Our team played really well defensively, most of the shots were from the outside and as a goalie if you have time to see the puck and time to react it's hard for them to score."

"They simplified a lot of things and that makes it really easy for me.""We had a couple exhibition games and things didn't really click very well for us," Kessler, the game's second star, said. "We really communicated a lot better today, simplified things, helped each other out and ultimately when you play as a unit things go your way.

Toronto now sits in second place with three points early on. The Furies will continue their 2015-2016 season with back-to-back games against cross-town rivals the Brampton Thunder next weekend.