The Blair Blazers defeated Upper Montgomery for the first time in three seasons abruptly ending the Lightning’s 2024 – 2025 varsity hockey season. Blair sophomore forward Mason Boucher scored 19 seconds into overtime to send the Blazers into the Montgomery Hockey Conference Varsity Tournament championship game. Blair will be a decided underdog next week when they play county powerhouse Churchill for the varsity tournament title. Upper Montgomery heads into the offseason needing to digest how to take the next steps to regularly defeat the top five or six teams in the county. Even though the Lightning have advanced up the county rankings over the past few seasons, there is still a sizeable amount of work to be done to qualify for the Maryland Student Hockey League state playoffs. Entering its 17th season of existence next year, the Lightning have never qualified for the state playoffs. Upper Montgomery finished as high as fifth in the county while winning the varsity tournament championship for the first time ever after last season.
All observers thought this game would be a hard fought low scoring contest throughout. They were not wrong. Neither team had more than a one goal lead in the contest which ebbed and flowed all game long. Upper Montgomery seemed to be chasing the game right from the outset as senior center, and the team’s leading scorer entering the game, Henry Honacki was called for a roughing penalty thirty seconds into the contest. The early penalty kill disrupted the flow of the line combinations and defensive pairings taking Upper Montgomery out of its regular rotations. The early powerplay permitted the Blazers to be aggressive from the start as numerous shots were fired toward Upper Montgomery sophomore goalie Ilan Shterenberg. Upper Montgomery’s penalty kill which struggled at times during the regular season stood tall to prevent the Blazers from jumping to an early lead.
Nine minutes into the game Upper Montgomery went to their first extra skater advantage when Blair junior defender Joseph Killebrew was sent to the penalty box for a tripping penalty. Although the Lightning had significant offensive zone time, the first opportunity the Blazers had to clear the defensive zone resulted in a penalty to Lightning senior defender Cole Howerton when he got his stick under the skates of the Blair forward exiting the defensive zone with puck possession. Upper Montgomery’s powerplay was over as the team’s skated for fifty seconds of four on four action. Once Killebrew returned to the ice, Blair went on their second powerplay of the game. While Blair was on the powerplay, Shterenberg made a routine save with Blair senior forward Ari Gardner standing nearby. A known agitator, Gardner started doing his thing. Upper Montgomery senior forward Josh Nadler was having none of it with both skaters ushered to the penalty box for coincidental cross checking penalties.
With two minutes remaining in the first period the Lightning broke through jumping to a 1-0 lead. The Blazers dumped the puck into the Upper Montgomery defensive zone with Shterenberg stopping the puck behind his net. Lightning sophomore defender Avery Evans swooped in to collect the puck. She sent a pass up the right wing boards to Upper Montgomery’s active leading scorer senior forward Nathan Cassel high in the Lightning’s defensive zone. Cassel’s zone exit outlet pass intended for Honacki was deflected. The pass instead found Upper Montgomery junior defender Owen Robbins in the right faceoff circle. Robbins connected with Honacki leading to the defensive zone clear.
Honacki passed the puck to his left for Upper Montgomery forward Philip Shkeda. Shkeda skated to his right before leaving a backhand pass for Cassel on the left wing. Cassel entered the Blair defensive zone against the left wing boards on a quick developing two on one rush with Shkeda after a Blazers defender fell while pivoting to skate backwards. From the outside of the left faceoff circle, Cassel centered the puck to Shkeda alone in the slot. Shkeda had time to position his body into a shooting stance where he roofed a shot into the top of the net over Blair junior goalie Sylvan Vernon’s outstretched left leg pad. It was Shkeda’s seventh goal of the season which gave the Lightning a late first period lead. Shots on goal in the opening period were twelve Blair shots on Shterenberg which were all turned aside and seven for Upper Montgomery with Shkeda’s finish the only shot getting past Vernon.
The tough fought game continued into the second period. It was a period that was very evenly played, but Blair found a way to score twice to jump into the lead. Three and a half minutes into the middle period Killebrew, not known for providing much offense, tallied his second goal of the season to get Blair even. From a faceoff in the right faceoff circle in the Blair defensive zone, Blair center Eva Caron won the draw to the boards. She swept the puck back to Killebrew in the left corner. Killebrew paused to assess the Lightning defensive alignment before heading up the ice with the puck. He went up the middle of the ice into the neutral zone on a solo rush against both Upper Montgomery defenders. He cut to his right where he was pushed by the Upper Montgomery defender wide to a bad shooting angle at the bottom of the right faceoff circle. His backhand shot toward the net somehow squirted between Shterenberg’s legs drawing the Blazers even.
A minute and a half later Blair went on their third powerplay of the evening when Lightning depth forward Siddy Bhasin was called for slashing. It was a very questionable call as there was not much force on the slash to the Blair forward’s pants. The Lightning penalty kill did an excellent job containing the Blazers for most of the powerplay. With twenty seconds remaining in Blair’s extra skater advantage, Honacki was a little overzealous checking a Blazers forward into the boards. The result of the check was a boarding penalty assessed to Honacki putting the Lightning down two skaters for fourteen seconds. Even more detrimental was that a boarding penalty call comes with an automatic ten minute misconduct penalty. Thus, the Lightning’s leading scorer would be out of action for twelve minutes of the game. The Lightning skaters and Shterenberg stood tall to kill off the short two person disadvantage and then the rest of the traditional extra skater Blair powerplay.
Ten seconds after Upper Montgomery returned to even strength, Blair’s leading scorer, Jackson Martindill, scored his seventh goal of the season to give Blair its first lead of the game. The scoring play began with Upper Montgomery sending the puck down the ice with it nestling in behind the Blair net. Blair senior defender Rafi Shore took the puck up the right side of the Blazers defensive zone. He sent the puck to Martindill as he was leaving the defensive zone. Martindill turned up ice skating all the way into the Lightning defensive zone. From the left wing he cut to the high slot. Now in the center of the ice he fired a wrist shot that got past Shterenberg to the stick side. With six minutes remaining in the second period the Lightning suddenly found themselves down in the game. Both Blair goals had been scored on innocent rushes up ice with plenty of Lightning defensive skaters in position defending.
With two and a half minutes left in the period, Howerton and Blair forward Danilo Azcarate got into a skirmish in front of the Upper Montgomery net. Both were assessed coincidental minor penalties for head contact. A penalty for head contact also comes with an automatic ten minute misconduct penalty. Both skaters were parked in the penalty box for the next twelve minutes of the game, only being released deep into the third period with approximately five minutes remaining in regulation time. Shots on goal in the middle frame were similar to the first period, thirteen for Blair with two finding pay dirt. Upper Montgomery countered with eight shots, all of which Vernon turned aside.
Trailing 2-1 entering the third period, Upper Montgomery had fifteen final minutes to find at least one goal to continue their season. The Lightning pushed the pace of play with defenders starting to join rushes up ice. The Upper Montgomery defenders began holding the offensive blue line pinching down the boards to keep the play alive in the offensive zone. One of the defensive pinches bore fruit when Blair forward Quinn Streaker was called for hooking with nine minutes remaining in the game.
Based upon the flow of the game, this powerplay opportunity appeared to be the chance the Lightning were looking for. It was such an important juncture in the game the Upper Montgomery coaching staff chose to utilize their timeout. The short break allowed all of the students to get a brief rest, refocus on the upcoming powerplay, and coordinate the plan of attack to attempt to knot up the game at two. A minute into the extra skater advantage, Blair cleared the puck all the way down to the Upper Montgomery defensive zone.
Upper Montgomery sophomore defender Miles Wendland took the puck behind his own net continuing into the right faceoff circle where he fired a pass up ice to Cassel in the neutral zone. Cassel stickhandled to center ice where he cut to the left proceeding to enter the offensive zone. He was pinned against the boards by three Blazers defenders. Cassel spiked the puck into the left wing corner. Wendland retrieved the puck passing it out to the front of the net to Shkeda. Shkeda’s shot went just wide to the short side with the puck bouncing off the side of the net. The Blair defense got to the puck first behind their cage while being pursued by Shkeda. A poor clearing pass was cut off up ice by Honacki along the right wing boards. Honacki sent a backhand pass to Robbins at the right point. Robbins skated around Honacki before sending the puck back to Cassel who had moved over to the right point. Cassel’s long range shot was saved by Vernon with Shkeda poking home the rebound on his backhand. Shkeda’s eighth goal of the season tied the game at two with eight minutes remaining. The marker also pushed Shkeda into the Lightning’s overall scoring lead for the season with 22 points.
Eight minutes remained for either team to emerge victorious. Both squads went for it offensively, with each team cognizant of getting back on defense to thwart the other team’s counterpunch rushes up ice. Each team generated one really good scoring chance that was snuffed out by the opposing goaltender. When the final horn sounded ending regulation time, the Lightning had fired a period high of twelve shots at Vernon while Blair was limited to their lowest total of the game with nine.
To open overtime, Upper Montgomery started with three of its top offensive skaters in Cassel, Shkeda, and Robbins playing at the defensive position. Blair countered with Boucher, sophomore forward William Campbell, and Killebrew. Boucher won the opening center ice faceoff to begin overtime. Campbell collected the puck in neutral ice before sending it back to Killebrew on the right side of the ice at his defensive blue line. With Cassel pushing up ice to force play, Killebrew sent the puck to his left along the defensive blue line over to Campbell on the left wing boards. Under pressure from Shkeda, Campbell ragged the puck up the left wing side of the ice. At the Upper Montgomery blue line, he cut inside of Robbins’ defense positioning thus being surrounded by the three Upper Montgomery defenders; Cassel on his right, Shkeda applying back pressure from behind, and Robbins on his left. Campbell sent a perfectly placed backhand pass through the Upper Montgomery defenders to Boucher who was skating hard toward the back right goal post. Clear of Cassel’s reach, Boucher settled the pass before he fired from directly in front of Shterenberg. The puck went past the Lightning goalie’s glove hand side into the back of the net for Boucher’s sixth goal of the season. It was by far the most important tally of his high school career to date. The Blair bench exploded over the boards onto the ice forming a red colored mosh pit in the far offensive corner of the ice. Just like that game over, along with it the Upper Montgomery season. Overtime concluded in only 19 seconds with no Lightning skater touching the puck.
With the loss Upper Montgomery’s season ended abruptly. It was the third straight season that the Lightning advanced at least to the semifinal round of the season ending Montgomery Hockey Conference varsity tournament. It will be a long offseason where the Upper Montgomery coaching staff will need to evaluate each student athlete’s strengths and weaknesses to come up with a style of play that permits the team to succeed against the more talented teams in the county. Each year is another opportunity for the program to end its two long streaks left to demolish, never having beaten Churchill and never having qualified for the Maryland Student Hockey League state playoffs. It will now be up to the 2025 – 2026 squad to make history.
Game Notes:
- Blair outshot Upper Montgomery 35-27 for the game.
- With his two goals junior forward Philip Shkeda finished the season as the Lightning’s top scorer with eight goals and fourteen assists for 22 points.
- Senior center Henry Honacki finished the season leading Upper Montgomery with twelve goals.
- Junior defender Brady Berkhammer finished the season leading Upper Montgomery with fifteen assists.
- Upper Montgomery finished the season with a 7-8-2 record, 6-5-1 in conference play. Both marks are the Lightning’s best winning percentages since the 2018 – 2019 season.
- The Lightning killed off all four Blazers powerplays.
- This was the third consecutive season that Upper Montgomery advanced at least to the Montgomery Hockey Conference varsity tournament semifinals.
Three Stars of the Game:
First Star—Philip Shkeda—Upper Montgomery Forward—2 Goals
Second Star—Ilan Shterenberg—Upper Montgomery Goalie—32 Saves, .914 Save Percentage
Third Star—Mason Boucher—Blair Forward—Game Winning Overtime Goal