December
20, 2004
March 21,
WAYNE - For the better part of 41 minutes, the Mahwah ice hockey team was probably wishing that it could borrow a rule from football and decline penalties on the opposing team. The Thunderbirds were victimized for two shorthanded goals and had failed on seven straight power plays in falling behind 3-1 against Wayne Hills.
After climbing back to 3-3 with two goals in 22 seconds late in the third period, the T-Birds went on another power play. This time, they capitalized on the man advantage as Jay Forkins rammed home the game-winning goal with 3:09 remaining.
The 4-3 win was a huge one for Mahwah as it put their overall record at 4-5-1 and upped their Northern Conference Blue Division to 2-5. Wayne Hills fell to 4-4-1 overall and 1-3-1 in the Blue.
The game-winning goal came after freshman Ralph Antonelli was tripped coming in on goal with 4:20 to go in the game. Chris Presioso, playing his first game of the season after transferring from Bergen Catholic, took a feed from Dan Tejada and put one towards the goal.
Forkins was able to get a stick on the puck amongst traffic in front of the net and flick it home for his fifth goal of the season.
"This was a great win for the new year," Mahwah head coach Sean Devine said. "A bit tough on the heart, but we'll take it."
The game started out well for the T-Birds as Antonelli scored just 24 seconds after the opening faceoff. The Patriots had put a pair of shots on goal, with the second being cleared to Dave Tippner on the right side. Chris Presioso made the clearing pass for the second assist.
Tippner began a 2 on 1 rush, drawing the defenseman to him before leaving a perfect pass on Antonelli's stick just to the left of Hills goalie Charlie Kemmlein. His quick shot easily beat him low to the left side for his sixth goal of the season.
From that point, though, the game shifted in Wayne Hills' favor. The Patriots got the game tied at the 5:20 mark as Rob Englehardt's shot from the right point was deflected home by David Rogers, his third of the year.
The Pats began taking penalty after penalty (11 overall in the game), but it actually worked in their favor. They were able to take the lead on a shorthanded tally at 8:04 of the first, as Bobby Griffin came in on goal from the right side and scored his third of the season on assists from Rogers and Chris Miller.
Hills got its second shorthanded goal 1:25 into the second period just five seconds after a Wayne penalty. Miller won the faceoff to Danny Berardi in the left circle, and his shot beat Thunderbird goalie Doug Cassidy cleanly for the 3-1 advantage.
Mahwah had a 5 on 3 chance in that middle stanza for 1:01 but could not muster a good shot, and Forkins clanged on off the crossbar in the second at even strength, sending the Pats into the third period up 3-1.
Another failed power play and a Presioso mini-breakaway that was saved further frustrated the T-Birds, but Devine made a change in his lines entering the final period. He put Dan Malandrucculo, Joe Walsh and Chris Gojdycz back together.
"We had shuffled the lines with Chris in the line-up," Devine said, "but in the third period we went back to the lines we had been using, and we ended up with the two big goals on one shift. Playing together with new guys was kind of troubling, and once we went back everything seemed to work much better."
At 8:35 of the third, Malandrucculo found the upper left corner off assists from Walsh and Gojdycz for his third of the season, and 22 seconds later Gojdycz put home his third of the campaign to tie the score. Walsh started the game-tying sequence, getting the puck to Jay Pollack on the right side. His shot was deflected past Kemmlein (31 saves) by Gojdycz at the right corner of the net.
Wayne Hills was 0 for 4 on the power play, as Cassidy finished with 20 saves, coming up big in the middle of the game to keep Mahwah within striking distance.
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