Wahconah Halts West Springfield Rally, Wins Fifth Straight

Goaltender Nico Romano stopped 38 of 42 stops as Wahconah defeated West Springfield, 5-4.

WEST SPRINGFIELD, Mass. — Wahconah Regional High School's ice hockey team spoiled Senior Day for West Springfield High School by hanging on to a 5-4 victory at the Olympia Ice Center on Saturday afternoon.

Wahconah, winners of five straight, improves to 8-6-1. West Springfield drops to 1-12-3 after its fourth straight loss.

Goaltender Nico Romano fended off 38 of 42 shots in the win and held West Springfield scoreless in the second while his team built a 5-1 lead.

"He made a lot of good saves," Wahconah coach Don Disbrow said. "He turns up big when he has to."

Sophomore forward Andrew Beaudoin led Wahconah with two goals. Hjalmar Gustafsson, Patrick Jamross and Mike Bloom each scored once. Mike Moreno tallied two assists and Devon Baittini added another.

After two minutes of back-and-forth play, the play collapsed toward West Springfield goaltender Nick Morissette. In the midst of the chaos, Beaudoin tapped the loose puck in.

Wahconah didn't let up though. Less than 20 seconds later, Gustafsson broke free on the left side and cut through the slot and beat Morissette for his team-leading ninth goal of the year.

West Springfield responded about three minutes later with a goal from Chris Bowers. From then until the third, Romano was impenetrable.

Wahconah turned up the pressure to close the period, which paid off when Jamross fired a shot from the high slot into the twine with 2:05 remaining.
 

Shortly after, Wahconah almost scored again when Devon Baittina passed across the slot but Bloom's stick didn't find the puck. After, Gustafsson battled and won the puck in the corner and tried to connect with a wide-open Beaudoin but the pass just missed.

The tone changed in the second as West Springfield relentlessly fired shots at Romano. However, they failed to place the biscuit in the oven. The physical game picked up on both sides the longer the puck stayed in Wahconah's defensive zone, with plenty of pushing and chirping.

Despite spending much of the first half of the second period on defense, Wahconah opened up the scoring with 5:57 remaining courtesy of Beaudoin's second goal of the game.

Towards the end of the period, Wahconah held a 5-on-3 advantage after Chris Bowers was sent to the box with 1:24 remaining following a slash and Justin Parczychoski joined him less than a minute later for cross-checking. Bloom took advantage of the situation, scoring just eight seconds after the second call.

Wahconah took a 5-1 lead into the intermission but West Springfield wasn't going down without a fight.

Wahconah started strong early in the period, spending most of the time attacking. But the effort didn't lead to any goals.

West Springfield began to chip away at the lead with a goal from Matt MacRae with less than nine minutes remaining. It followed that goal up with a power-play goal from Drew Rossman with 4:58 remaining.

With a little more than four minutes remaining, West Springfield's Nick Rolandi was sent to the box for hooking. West Springfield called a timeout, killed the penalty and inched closer to a comeback with another goal from Rossman, prompting a timeout from Wahconah with 1:44 to go. Disbrow said the team needed to rest and figure out their next two lines.

"The goals were coming a little too fast and furious there and they were making a big push and we wanted to regain our composure," Disbrow said. "It was just getting guys to settle down and focus and get a little bit of a rest."

Wahconah kept the puck too close for Morissette to retreat to the bench until the 43 second mark, but West Springfield failed to finish the rally.

The next game for Wahconah is scheduled for Wednesday, Feb. 12, at 6:30 p.m. against Turners Falls High School at the Boys and Girls Club in Pittsfield.