St Joseph's Prep Hawks

Woodland Hills fights off Kiski and penalties to score big win

DELMONT –

       When I glanced at the schedule for Monday Night for Interscholastic Hockey, I usually will try to find a couple games in Class AAA, AA and A to watch a couple of Penguins Cup contenders on one trip killing two birds with one stone. You’d figure in early January you could find some intruiging match-ups and on this night I could not. So plan B sent me to Delmont for a game between my former team Woodland Hills and Kiski. Both schools play in the Open Division and have avoided the Class AAA for several years now because the PIHL will not allow them to play in Class AAA nor Class AA nor Class A because they do not have developmental programs, which is their stance, but the reality is that they have pigeon holed all of these so-called Developmental teams in the Open Division.

        The Open Division is made up of schools who no one else including the schools in Class AAA wants to play period. The are a unique way for the PIHL to bill for their poor service and an additional fine base for people who choose not to attend their boring but recently entertaining meetings, because some people are raising questions about their SECRET finances. Word on the street is that one of their former Treasurer’s companies is under Federal investigation, which does not surprise me and should not surprise any of you either.

        So you have 4 West Virginia schools (excluding Wheeling Park who opted for Class AAA), 9 Co-Op schools ranging from Carrick or Ringgold, who has several schools represented on its roster to Derry, who has just one or two players from another school, which tells me that they could not find ONE OR A COUPLE more kid in their district to put in uniform to become a pure High School Team from Derry Area (or maybe that one kid is pretty good ?). I am not here to pick on any one of those schools, but there is NO MOTIVATION for any other schools to build hockey programs if their players are plucked by surrounding schools, which has led to the demise of South Allegheny, West Mifflin, Steel Valley, Belle Vernon’s, Penn Hills, Blackhawk, and other schools who will never resurface as a hockey program EVER. How is this Developmental Hockey? It’s not, it’s a billing machine with bad processes.

         A quick glance at the Flyers Cup, which is a part of the Pennsylvania High School Hockey Championships shows that Eastern Pa has a Class AAA division with only a dozen schools and the rest of the 100 plus schools is either Class AA or Class A. To delve even further, Massachusetts has it’s Super 8 Division and the 3 A, 2 A and 1 A Classifications. Illinois has the Red Varsity and then a combined State Championship for rural Co-Op teams. The point is that every school has an opportunity to play for a State Championship and there is not this mess of teams that no one wants to play [that is according to PIHL logic and NOT MINE] in any other State in the Country, but right here in Western Pa, with the exception of New York, which has the battle between Federation Sanctioned School Teams and USA Hockey Club teams, which is a whole other story.

           During the National Invitational Scholastic Showcase, two local Co-Op teams tried to schedule games right in the middle of our event, which goes to show you that this is not an exclusive problem to Western Pennsylvania. Co-Op Teams are NOT HIGH SCHOOL HOCKEY, they are SELECTED PLAYERS WHO FORM A TEAM AND PLAY UNDER A PARTICULAR HIGH SCHOOL BANNER, which I still can’t understand how a principal can sign off on to validate a roster.

         To round out the Open Division lineup are nine schools including Holidaysburg, Altoona, Connellsville, Ferndale, Allderdice, Ambridge, Trinity, and tonight’s combatants Woodland Hills and Kiski. These schools and teams are the BEST at reporting scores and results to PA Hockey as they religiously send in their highlights and Pa Hockey is the place you can find out what is happening with the Open Division as we rank them weekly.  So why is Altoona, Holidaysburg, Woodland Hills, Connellsville, Allderdice, and Ambridge who all have pretty good teams not in Class AA where they could be competing for a State Title?

           And people wonder why the Kool-Aid serving Junior B,C,D and probably next E & F and Midget AAA [glorified AA teams] programs are flourishing, well that is the next editorial. So Woodland Hills and Kiski, with nothing more to look forward to than playing the other 5 Co-Op teams in their divisions and maybe Carrick [who wasn’t allowed to participate in the Open Division playoffs last year], continued their rivalry with one another in pursuit of Ford City [a/k/a Armstrong Central – Kittanning] for first place.

           After watching the first period, I came to the quick realization that both Woodland Hills and Kiski, would be pretty good Class AA teams and the Woodland Hills team I was watching had way more talent in their lineup than I had 11 years ago (when we competed pretty well [didn’t win a lot of games but competed] in Class AAA] and what a shame they are not playing for anything except their schools, which is more than we can say for some others, who choose to take the lazy Co-Op route. Woodland Hills took a 3-1 lead in a very close opening period courtesy of goals from Billy Sullivan, Nate Simon and Zach Brown and Kiski’s Phil Cappo scored the lone Cavalier goal.

          The second period was a barrage of penalties as Kiski had numerous power plays and outshot the Wolverines 21-5, but Woody High had the only goal courtesy of defenseman Matt Frank, who found enough energy to score while helping kill off several 5 on 3’s and other penalties. Ryan Hast was superb stopping all 21 shots in the second period.

          The third period continued to be a penalty fest as Woodland Hills continued to kill them off and Darren Pellegrino scores a shorthanded goal at 13:43 to make it 5-2 Wolverines. Kiski mounted a comeback with two power play goals by Colin Mahoney, but the Wolverines Zach Brown scored his second to close it out for a 6-3 WH win. Ryan Hast continued his strong play in the third period stopping 17 of 19 Kiski shots and 47 of 50 shots on the evening as the shot clock was more like a slot machine, courtesy of 12 Kiski power plays to only 3 for Woodland Hills, which was a little lopsided. 

       Maybe next time these teams meet, it will be in Class AA next year and for a Penguin Cup playoff spot.