The Upper Montgomery Lightning played poorly against an inferior opponent yet found a way to claw back to tie Rockville/Magruder Thursday afternoon at Rockville Ice Arena. The team now awaits the outcome of the final junior varsity conference games in early January to determine if they will earn the fifth, sixth, or seventh seed in the upcoming Montgomery Hockey Conference junior varsity playoff tournament. The Lightning lost the opportunity to host a first round playoff game by failing to secure the additional standings point a win would have provided.
From the opening faceoff, it looked like Upper Montgomery would run away with this contest. On the opening shift, just 33 seconds into the game, the Lightning would jump out in front. In the offensive zone, off of a faceoff in the right circle, Henry Honacki intentionally won the puck forward. He lost control of the puck in among the Rockville/Magruder defense. Adam Levine was standing in front of the goal to set a screen. Seeing the puck, Levine reached for it and while turning his body back toward the net, fired a wrist shot that went five hole on unsuspecting Rockville/Magruder netminder Lily Bendavid.
Although controlling play throughout the period and outshooting Rockville/Magruder ten to five overall, Upper Montgomery had one breakdown and it led directly to the Rams’ game tying goal. Off of a missed Upper Montgomery shot, Rafael Shore collected the puck behind the Rams’ net. He backhanded the puck up the left wing boards where it was collected by Rams’ forward Chance Hostetler. Hostetler skated up ice during a late and poorly executed Upper Montgomery defensive line change. He beat the Lightning defense into the offensive zone and went in alone on Lightning backup netminder Chris Hassett. Hostetler beat Hassett with a low wrist shot from the bottom of the right circle. The puck whizzed by Hassett’s leg pads into the left hand side of the net. It would be the only goal given up by Hassett, in what was his best performance in goal of the season. Going into the contest the coaching staff was going to split the game in net between Hassett and starting goalie Landon Bernard.
The Lightning jumped in front again at the beginning of the second period. With Upper Montgomery on the powerplay after a bad retaliatory penalty taken by Rams’ defender Connor Casp, Josh Nadler would score in his third consecutive game. Behr Schickler was in a board battle along the right wing boards just inside the Upper Montgomery offensive zone. A Rockville/Magruder forward pried the puck loose. Nadler was there to quickly grab the puck away a few feet inside the blue line. He skated around and through three Rams defenders and stopped just outside the crease. Nadler fired a wrist shot blocker side. The puck hit Bendavid’s blocker, popped up, and tumbled over her blocker into the net to give Upper Montgomery a brief lead.
At the mid-point of the game, Bernard took over in net and the team immediately relaxed. The result was two quick goals against, both scored by Hostetler in similar fashion. The Lightning went from a one goal lead to trailing by a goal on the same shift. First, Hostetler was missed in the neutral zone by the Lightning defense. He skated in wide around the other Lightning defender and was in alone on Bernard. He shot forehand between Bernard’s stick side arm and body with the puck squirting through for the tying goal. Twenty-one seconds later, Charles Sickel had the puck along the right wing boards in the neutral zone. He moved the puck off the boards a few feet. Hostetler picked it up and skated into the Lightning offensive zone one on one against the Upper Montgomery defender. He quickly faked around the defender and was again in alone on Bernard. This time he faked and went backhand putting the puck past Bernard stick side.
After Hostetler’s outburst, Upper Montgomery tightened up the defense considerably. The Lightning held the Rams to only three additional shots on goal in the second period and just five shots on goal in the third period. Upper Montgomery kept pushing throughout the balance of the second period and the entire third period. Looking to score the game tying goal, the coaches shortened the bench. Further complicating the comeback was a boarding penalty that comes with an automatic ten minute misconduct penalty that was issued to Nadler with just under eight minutes remaining in the game. Upper Montgomery once again killed off the Rams’ powerplay, their third successful kill of the game, but the Lightning would be without Nadler for the rest of the contest.
Upper Montgomery took a timeout with two and a half minutes left in the game. The purpose of the timeout was to give the student athletes a breather as the coaches were preparing to put the same five skaters back on the ice for a second consecutive shift. It was this group’s third shift over the last four shifts. Upper Montgomery placed heavy pressure on the Rams but could not get the tying goal past Bendavid. Upon the conclusion of that shift, with 1:25 remaining in the game, the Rockville/Magruder coaching staff made a major blunder in calling their own timeout. This allowed Upper Montgomery’s five skaters to catch their breath and head right back onto the ice with Bernard pulled for the extra skater.
Upper Montgomery controlled the faceoff in the neutral zone and worked the puck into the offensive zone. Eventually, the puck was shot wide of the net and retrieved along the boards by Adam Levine. Levine reversed the puck around the net to the left wing boards to Honakci. Honacki shot the puck from deep alongside the left wing boards. Bendavid made a pad save with the rebound skidding into the right wing corner. Levine fought along the corner boards with the Rams’ defender winning possession of the puck. He skated as if he was going to go back around the net once again from right to left. Before he was too far behind the net, he centered the puck to AJ Marks in the slot. Marks’ backhand shot from point blank range was stopped by Bendavid. The rebound bounced past Marks to Honacki who was a few feet further away from the net. Honacki’s lofted backhand shot found the back of the net short side before Bendavid could recover and reposition herself.
The pulled goalie goal evened the score with 45 seconds remaining in the game and allowed Upper Montgomery to salvage a point out of a game the team should have won. The Lightning now awaits the concluding weekend of junior varsity games to determine what seed they have earned for the season ending junior varsity playoff tournament. Depending upon other teams’ game outcomes, Upper Montgomery will either finish with the fifth, sixth, or seventh seed in the ten team tournament which is likely to begin on Monday, January 16th.
Game Notes:
- The Lightning’s leading scorer TJ Gottesman missed his second consecutive game.
- The Lightning outshot Rockville/Magruder 28-20 for the game.
- Henry Honacki scored his team leading seventh goal of the season and for the third game in a row.
- Adam Levine set a career high for goals in a season with three and points in a season with seven. He has tallied points in three consecutive games.
- Josh Nadler scored for the third consecutive game.
- The Upper Montgomery powerplay scored for the second consecutive game.
- The Lightning penalty kill was a perfect 3-3 in the game and has now killed off 17 of the last 18 opponent’s powerplay opportunities.
- The Upper Montgomery junior varsity concludes the regular season over winter break with a non-conference game against Carroll County. Game time is 8:20 pm on Tuesday evening, December 27th at Skate Frederick.
Three Stars of the Game:
First Star—Chance Hostetler—Rockville/Magruder Forward—3 Goals
Second Star—Adam Levine—Upper Montgomery Forward–1 Goal, 1 Assist
Third Star—Lily Bendavid—Rockville/Magruder Goalie–25 Saves, .892 Save Percentage