In a record-setting win on Friday night, the Clarkson University Women’s Hockey team kept its bid for the ECAC Hockey regular-season title alive as the Golden Knights skated past Dartmouth College 3-1 at Thompson Arena in Hanover, NH.

Ranked 6th/7th in the national polls, Clarkson has set a new school mark for wins in a season with a 25-8 overall record. The Knights, who close out the regular season on Saturday with a 4:00 p.m. game at fifth-ranked Harvard, are tied for second place in the league standings, along with the Crimson, owning a 17-4 ECAC Hockey mark. The Green and Gold are one-point behind conference leader Cornell. Harvard still has two games to play in its season.

The victory also gave the Clarkson coaching staff, co-head coaches Matt and Shannon Desrosiers and assistant Matt Kelly, their 100th career win.

In a penalty-filled game, Clarkson built a 3-1 first-period lead and then rode the solid play of junior Erica Howe (Ottawa, ONT) to earn its second straight win and fourth victory in the past five games. The Knights’ all-time win leader, Howe posted 31 saves, including 23 over the final 40 minutes to improve her career mark to 56-25-10.

Specialty teams played a major role in the game as Clarkson went 1-of-5 on the power play and killed off eight of nine Dartmouth chances.

Freshman Olivia Howe (Moose Jaw, SASK) began the scoring with her fourth goal of the year just 2:40 after the opening faceoff. Junior Shelby Nisbet (Wiseton, SASK) and sophomore Christine Lambert (Thetford Mines, QUE) assisted.

The Knights’ leading scorer, junior Jamie Lee Rattray (Kanata, ONT) made it 2-0 for Clarkson with her team-high 18th goal of the season, a power-play tally at 15:32. Junior Brittany Styner (Calgary, ALB) and freshman defenseman Erin Ambrose (Keswick, ONT) earned the assists. With the goal, Rattray has tied the school-record for points in a season with 44. Ambrose, the nation’s leading rookie scorer from the blueline, has also tied the program’s mark for assists in a season with 27.

Dartmouth (15-8-5, 10-7-4) got on the scoreboard with an unassisted power-play goal from Laura Stacey at 16:59.

With 49 seconds remaining in the opening stanza, Clarkson regained its two-goal advantage when junior captain Carly Mercer (Exeter, ONT) scored off an assist from freshman Shannon MacAulay (Mt. Herbert, PEI) for her 15th goal of the 2012-13 campaign.

The Big Green outshot the Knights 32-26. Lindsay Holdcroft made 23 saves for Dartmouth.