By Mike Gurnis
4-Montville 2, 5-Mount Olive-Hopatcong-Hackettstown 1
It’s often said that it’s hard to beat a good team three times in a season.
But don’t tell that to Montville, which managed to hold off Mo-Ho-Ha for the third time this year in a hard-fought 2-1 victory on Saturday.
“It’s always tough to play a team three times in a season, and even harder to beat them three times,” Montville goalie Dylan Hunter said. “We played well.”
Hunter was at the center of Montville’s success in this game, as he stopped 27 of the 28 shots he faced. His team was out-shot 28-22 overall.
The Mustangs jumped ahead in the first period thanks to goals from Cole Riley and C.J. Corino.
Corino’s came off a rebound of a Riley shot with just 29 seconds left in the first period to give the Mustangs the early 2-0 advantage.
The second period, though, saw Mo-Ho-Ha apply a lot of pressure early. It paid off with a power play goal with 9:33 to go in the period which gave the team some life. Its best chance to tie the game came with 9:59 left in the third period, when the puck appeared to get past Hunter, however the referees waived the goal off as there was intent to blow the whistle on a loose puck in the crease.
Montville clamped down in the final minutes of the game, putting on a puck-possession clinic until an icing gave Mo-Ho-Ha offensive zone time in the final 40 seconds. Hunter came up huge, like he did all game, to help secure his team’s spot in the Halvorsen Cup semifinals.
“I love my guys. When they play good defense, it’s amazing,” Hunter said. “They always play good defense, but especially tonight. They really held strong, props to them.”
Mo-Ho-Ha goalie Connor Lomax made 20 saves. Montville previously defeated Mo-Ho-Ha by scores of 2-1 (Jan. 3) and 5-3 (Feb. 4).
Mo-Ho-Ha went 6-4 against every team in the division not named Montville.
Hunter said of his team’s success against Mo-Ho-Ha: “Just hard work in the corners, and just always putting in that work. Especially in practice. We know what to work on.”
3-Madison 8, 6-Bernards-Somerville-Middlesex 1
Madison won a Cup playoff game for the first time in five years thanks to a four-goal performance from Lucas Gero.
After a tight first period which saw Madison score just once- on a goal from Ryan McSherry- the Dodgers opened it up in the second period with five goals, two of which came off the stick of Gero. McSherry, Quinn Leary, and Gero all scored in the final two minutes of the second to build a commanding 6-0 lead and put the game out of reach.
After an even first period in shots, Madison ended up outshooting BSM 44-21 for the game.
“We came out flat. We did not bring our game,” Gero said. “We’ve had slow starts throughout the season, which is what this was. We realized that we needed to pick it up and start playing our game.”
Gero added two more in the third period. His six-point (four goals, two assists) performance brought him to 37 goals and 31 assists, for a total of 68 points. That total is tied for the single-season best in Madison program history.
“It means everything,” Gero said of the single-season points record. “I watched all these games growing up, my cousins were on the team. It just would mean the world to me to break it.”
Nick Worthington stopped 20 of 21 shots for the Dodgers. Madison out-scored BSM by a score of 16-1 in the three meetings between the two teams this season.
James Chesson scored BSM’s first goal against Madison this year with 2:04 left in the third period, which was a power play goal.
Madison improved to 16-4 on the season, while BSM fell to 2-15-1 on the year.
WHAT’S NEXT
Madison will take on second-seeded Park Regional on Wednesday at 5:45 p.m. It will be the third meeting between the squads in a span of two weeks, as Park Regional won 3-2 on Jan. 28 before Madison earned a 2-0 win on Feb. 4.
“It’s a big rivalry,” said Gero. “Both games that we played last week were battles, 45 minutes of battles. We don’t expect anything different in this one.”
In the first semifinal on Wednesday, Montville will face top-seeded West Morris at 4 p.m. West Morris won both of the previous meetings by scores of 5-2 and 8-3. Montville, though, has turned its season around after an 0-7 start, and has gone 9-3 since and appears to be playing its best at the right time.
Hunter said, “(We) just have to work hard, and what’s working now has been working pretty good. Just have to keep that up.”
E-mail Mike Gurnis at michaelgurnis@gmail.com
Morris-Sussex Hockey Report 