Romano Backstops Wahconah to Win Over Mount Everett
NORTH ADAMS, Mass. -- The Wahconah hockey team defeated Mount Everett, 3-2, Wednesday afternoon at Pete W. Foote
Memorial Rink.
Memorial Rink.
Wahconah got off to a slow start, with Mount Everett putting up a lot of first period shots. The Eagles took a 1-0 first period lead after scoring off a power play with 6:21 remaining. The shot came from outside from Jacob Malicky, assisted by Jake Corcoran.
“We started off pretty slow in the first period,” Wahconah coach Don Disbrow said. “Of course we had two games and two or three practices canceled within the last week, so we haven’t been on the ice much and we were pretty rusty in that first period.”
But Wahconah came out in the second and was able to take away the lead from Everett. The hosts put up a lot of good shots in front of the Everett goal, and their first came on the power play with 5 minutes,21 seconds remaining.
Mike Bloom was able to get a shot from the right corner through the Everett goalie to tie it at 1-1. With less than three minutes to go in the period, Wahconah took a 2-1 lead off a backhanded shot from Andrew Beaudoin.
Mount Everett came out strong in the third period, getting a lot of good looks on net, but Wahconah goalie Niko Romano had some huge saves, one in particular in the final 2:00 minutes when Everett was looking to tie it at 3-3.
Corcoran was able to break away and he let a shot off from outside that was going to the high right corner, but Romano was able to stop it to hold onto the lead.
“Niko is good on his angles and quick side to side,” Disbrow said. “He’s got a very good glove hand that I think goes unnoticed, he’s pretty solid all the way around.”
Wahconah put that score at 3-1 in the third with 9:54 to go off a goal from Kyle Bazonski, but less than a minute later Mount Everett responded putting it 3-2 on the first career goal for Samantha Hoover.
With 2:06 remaining in the game Mount Everett called a timeout; it pulled its goalie with less than a minute to go, putting the extra player on the ice.
“We wanted to keep an eye on Corcoran, we wanted to know where he was and make sure he wasn’t getting on his forhand,” Disbrow said. “Other than that, they’re going to put pucks on net and we either have to block them or make the first save and clear rebounds as quick as possible and try and man up once those rebounds are there.”
Mount Everett had a few opportunities in the final minute in front of the net, but Wahconah was able to hold them for the win.