The Wisconsin Badgers are 2025 National Champions

The Ohio State Buckeyes played a nearly perfect game against the Wisconsin Badgers for about 58 minutes on Sunday, controlling the neutral zone, blocking shots and generally keeping UW from doing any of things that had brought them to this point with just a single loss.

OSU carried a 3-2 lead into the final minutes of regulation. But with 1:50 left on the clock, their bench got antsy and they were called for too many player on the ice, giving Wisconsin a power play. The Badgers pulled their goalie with about a minute left to have a two-skater advantage. As they peppered the net and goalie Amanda Thiele, who came up big over and over again, Ohio State's Maddi Wheeler covered the puck with her hand and pulled it under herself in an attempt to clear it.

Nothing was called initially, but at the next whistle, Laila Edwards rushed to the bench and told her coaches what she saw. Mark Johnson asked for a coach's challenge with 18.9 seconds left in the third. The refs agreed with Edwards' assessment and Wisconsin was awarded a penalty shot.

The broadcast seemed to show Kirsten Simms volunteering to take the shot when Johnson asked "who wants it?" But in the post game presser, she said, " I can't really say it was initially my choice."

The rest of the Badgers felt Simms was the only choice to take the penalty shot and it was there goading that had her volunteering when Johnson asked. As they waited for play to resume, her teammates pumped up Simms, giving her the confidence she'd need to have in order to be successful.

“We know she’s the best goal scorer on the team, so we had to let her know and remind her and tell her she’s clutch,” said Edwards.

Simms made five moves in the lead up to the net and pulled Thiele to one side before going back to her forehand to tie the game 3-3 and force overtime.

Wisconsin had all the momentum and the power of a crowd that seemed to be 90% Badger fans.

After being absolutely shut down in transition and in front of the net, they scored just 2:49 into overtime on a rush by Lacey Eden, who's shot was saved by Thiele, but kicked out in front of the net. Joy Dunne nearly cleared it, but a touch by Simms gave her enough control to send the puck back into the net and win the game 4-3 for Wisconsin.

But the game had gone very differently before those final few minutes. Dunne had Ohio State up 1-0 midway through the first on a beautiful short-handed tally where she skated the length of the ice and around several Badgers before beating Goalie of the Year Ava McNaughton 13 seconds into the penalty.

But UW was still on the power play and Laila Edwards equalized the game 12 seconds after Dunne's goal, winning the puck along the neutral zone boards and heading in alone on Thiele. She pulled the goalie across the goal mouth and tucked the puck around her to make it a 1-1 game.

With about five minutes left in the first, Sloane Matthews took the puck right off Edwards stick around the blue line and quickly took it to to net, beating McNaughton with a snipe to give OSU the 2-1 lead heading into the first intermission.

Ohio State's Emma Peschel said the team reset at each intermission and was playing like the score was 0-0 or even down a goal. So it's not surprising that the Buckeyes came out of the break flying off the opening faceoff. A deflected centering pass deflected into the faceoff circle and Peschel stepped up from the blue line to unleash a gorgeous one-timer to extend OSU's lead to 3-1 10 seconds into the second.

They get forgotten in the wake of what happened to secure the championship , but even before that, this game was full of absolutely filthy goals.

Caroline Harvey continued the snipe-fest, pulling one back for Wisconsin five minutes later, making it a one-goal game. Simms flashed some quick thinking and gorgeous puck control to keep possession and wait for Harvey to be open for the pass.

But the Badgers could not get the game closer. As time ticked by, Ohio State tightened up even more in front of the net and continued to force turnovers and prevent Wisconsin from building out of the back or creating any flow. Even on the late power play, the Badgers struggled for clean looks while the Buckeyes blocked shots, clogged lanes and made life difficult for UW.

The mental mistake on the line change started a chain of events that Ohio State couldn't stop from snowballing.

“Going in overtime with them tying it so late, it was hard. We knew that there was a momentum shift. We talked about that all weekend, but we knew that right from the jump we had to get on it. We had to get that momentum back. And unfortunately, we couldn’t grasp it,” said Peschel.