Vero Beach traveled to Boca Raton last Wednesday to play Boca Raton in the first of a two-day swing through the area high schools and got the road trip off to a good start with an 8-6 victory over Boca Raton. Vero used a stifling man to man defense and timely offensive production to produce the victory. The first quarter started out somewhat sloppily as the teams combined for 12 turnovers in the first quarter before settling down. Boca opened the scoring on an unassisted goal by Ryan Clinton at the 8:12 mark. Vero tied it up by an unassisted dodge from behind the cage by Dylan Cannon to end the period at 1-1. Each team shot 7 times but Boca put only 2 on net. This has been Boca’s Achilles heel all season and that theme carried through the second quarter too. In the second quarter Vero’s Winton Roschach scored on a crease feed from Tyler Martin 35 seconds into the period. Boca’s Jake Schickles tied it with the first of his three goals on a nice spin move and bounce shot to the far corner with 4:01 left. Clinton then sent Vero to the locker room with his second of the half on basically the same move from his first goal with under two minutes to go, leading Vero to a 3-2 lead. Shots for the half were 14 for Boca, with only 5 hitting the cage and 11 for Vero, with 7 of those on goal. Vero started to assert itself on face-offs, taking a 5-2 edge at that point. Boca protected the ball better in the second, turning it over only twice. Vero came out in the third and stretched the lead by scoring the first four goals of the period. Roschach with his second at 8:07 off a back door feed from Austen Zugelter, followed by Trey Tench from Cannon on a similar feed at 3:20, Cole O’Brien’s solo dash at 1:55 and Zugelter’s first, also unassisted 27 seconds later. Boca’s Schickles pulled one back with 13 seconds left on a Nick Schultz feed sending the teams to the fourth with Vero leading 7-3. Vero dominated the face-off circle and started to wear down the Boca defense with long possessions. Boca was only able to get 4 shots off in the period to Vero’s 11 and they also had to defend 2 EMO’s in the period. In the fourth Boca added to its run by scoring at the 10:50 mark on Schickles’ third off a Clinton feed on Vero’s only penalty of the second half (and only their second of the game) to close the margin to three. After a number of turnovers for both teams Boca narrowed the margin again on an unassisted Nick McCabe goal to make it 7-5. Unfortunately for Boca, Vero continued its domination of the face-offs and with the help of both timeouts were able to run time off the clock, and eventually Zugelter posted a late goal to push the lead back to three. Schultz added a last minute goal off a McCabe feed but that was the last gasp for Boca and the game ended 8-6. The statistics were revealing for the game: Face-offs: Vero 13 – Boca 4 Shots: Boca 30 – Vero 27 SOG: Boca 13 – Vero 16 Turnovers: both teams had 20 Boca took 5 penalties while Vero took 2 Boca’s Nick Martin made 8 saves in the game and Vero’s Jeff Ley made 7. A good crowd was in attendance for the mid-week game as a number of Vero parents made the two day trip and Boca’s fans tend to show in numbers every game. One note of criticism – the timekeeping got a little sloppy in the fourth quarter. Please volunteers, remember what comes first when you volunteer for these duties. Vero was led by Zugelter and Cannon’s 2G/1A, with Roschach’s 2G. Tench and O’Brien finished with 1G each and Martin contributed his assist. Vero was led by Schickles’ 3G, with Clinton, McCabe and Schultz each going 1G/1A. I’d also like to point out Boca’s Harrison Rodormer, who has not played a bad game anytime I’ve seen him. A long pole who plays with a lot of poise and always seems to make the right decisions; he can also chip in offensively when the opportunity presents itself without taking unnecessary chances. Thanks also to both Coach Moriarity and Coach Holly for spending time with me after the game.