
#1 SA Cruises to District Title With 21-5 Win Over Boca Raton
Written by Lee Roggenburg on . Posted in Uncategorized.
If this was a 12 minute game we’d be writing quite a bit about it.
But alas it was a 48 minute game . . .
5 minutes into the game you’d look at the scoreboard and memories on the 1980 Olympics might have flashed in your mind.
An early SA score followed by three Boca goals in 72 seconds. None of them cheap goals.
Then two and a half minutes later it was 5-3 SA.
And with a minute left Boca added one to make it 5-4 after the first.
The Boca fans were pretty vociferous as the horn sounded. Rightly so.
. . .
. . .
. . .
That’s the sound fans make when your opponent then scores the next 16 goals
Not like Boca played those 35:47 between goals (they did score the last one with 1:14 left) that badly.
Because they didn’t.
SA played like they had a chip on their shoulder. Like being questioned about plateauing . . .
Time to play for keeps.
Oxbridge in Round One and if successful, Likely to be St. Thomas or Stoneman in Round Two. (STA plays tonight for the district title)
Two different dynamics. Easy winner the first time . . . remembering last year’s big loss the second time.
So many stories in so few games.
Let’s get ready to rumble was never so appropriate.
As you might expect, this was not fun to watch if you were a Boca fan after the first quarter. At 5-4 SA after one.
Six goals in 2:42 of game time in the second.
9-0 overall for 14-4 at half.
18-4 after three.
And Boca goalie Spencer Dobkin played very well.
Thankfully.
In the first three quarters SA fired 49 shots and hit the cage with 29 of them.
Ouch.
In the first 6 minutes Boca’s Fogo Chase Spengler held his own against SA’s savant Gable Braun. Splitting the first six.
Then Gable and his understudy, Daniel Zamora, then went 21 for 22 the rest of the game.
And for the second consecutive game a team came up with 16 assisted goals. Teamwork at its’ finest.
To their credit Boca came to play they didn’t try to hold the ball and run off clock.
It was a trying year for the team and the program.
And last night didn’t change that.
With the exception of this game the season did have some bright spots at the end.
An OT loss to Benjamin, big win over Wellington and a huge win over SJP II in the district gives them something to build on going into the summer.
One week from tonight you will see some great teams paired up in the area.
Take advantage.
The 1st period was terrific. SA opened the scoring at 9:46 as Matt Adams finished off a fast break off a turnover as he took a long feed from Davis Diamond near the left crease and he faked low before going high. Boca responded with their three goal run. Mitchell Doane cut to the middle from the left wing and his right hand found the high short side at 8:38. 28 seconds later Kyle Romano took advantage of a failed clearing pass, intercepting it in the middle of the field and finishing off a clean breakaway to the low right corner and at 7:26 Brad Ging took Nick McCabe’s left wing feed on the low left and his shot found the top short side for 3-1.
SA rallied with 3 goals of their own in 58 seconds. At 4:31 Carl Klepper scored the first of his 6 goals as Nick Diamond found him cutting the middle from right GLE and he finished right hand low, drawing a penalty on the play. At 3:37 the game was tied as N. Diamond took Nick Iznaga’s feed from out on the left side, as he cut into the space on the left wing and hit the low right side. Then SA’s Gable took advantage of a procedure call to find Iznaga for the left wing step down for 4-3. At 1:58 the run continued as Owen Bezick took the feed from Tito Thomson in the middle and his underhand shot found the net low for 5-3 and less than a minute later it was Boca’s Michael Clinton taking the Romano feed on a fast break and his left wing shot hit the top left corner to end the first.
But from then on it only got ugly.
2nd
8:55 – N. Diamond from Iznaga from left GLE
8:10 – Iznaga unassisted left wing to the middle
7:58 – Klepper from N. Diamond on the crease
7:08 – EMO as D. Diamond finds Brian Fox from behind the net
6:52 – Thompson from N. Diamond for a right crease dunk shot
6:13 – Mark Heatzig from Iznaga on a middle cut
4:49 – Klepper from D. Diamond as he curled from left GLE
1:27 – Fox on a right wing face dodge towards the middle
0:46 – EMO as Fox and D. Diamond replicated the 7:08 play
3rd
10:18 – EMO as Iznaga takes Fox’s feed on left wing and steps down
9:38 – Klepper steals a pass from the goalie and curls out front
7:31 – Iznaga dodges from left wing to the middle
0:22 – N. Diamond feeds Klepper on the left crease for the dunk
4th
7:25 – N. Diamond to Klepper on the right crease
5:24 – Zamora taking the Xavier McCormack feed in the middle
4:17 – Justin Cohen dodging the middle and hitting the bounce shot
1:14 – Boca closes out the game as Romano gets his second off a left wing spin move
On Friday the 15th Saint Andrews travels north to Oxbridge for the first round.
Team Statistics
Faceoffs: SA 24-4
Shots: SA 53-23
Shots on Goal: SA 32-12
Turnovers: 15 each
Penalties: Boca 4-2
Individual Statistics
SA
Carl Klepper 6G
Nick Iznaga 4G/3A
Brian Fox 4G/1A
Nick Diamond 1G/5A
Davis Diamond 4A
Tito Thompson 1G/1A
Matt Adams, Owen Bezick, Mark Heatzig, Daniel Zamora and Justin Cohen 1G each
Gable Braun and Xavier McCormack 1A each
Nick Ferraro and Andrew Buzel combined for 7 saves
Boca
Kyle Romano 2G/1A
Mitchell Doane, Brad Ging and michael Clinton 1G each
Nick McCabe 1A
Spencer Dobkin with 11 saves
Thanks to Coach Seaman and Coach Holly for talking to me before and after the game