St Joseph's Prep Hawks

2007 Pennsylvania High School Hockey Championships Saturday April 7, 2007 Ice Works - Aston, Pennsylvania The Pennsylvania High School Hockey Championships began in April 1975 in Erie, Pennsylvania. This year marks the 32nd year of the State Finals and teams from Eastern and Western Pennsylvania are gearing up for a playoff run that will bring us all to the Ice Works in Aston, Pa for the Class A, AA and AAA State finals. The complete history of the Pennsylvania High School Hockey Championships including the Penguins Cup and Flyers Cup in now available by clicking on the logos and Pennsylvania Cup AAA - AA - A Previews can be seen by clicking on the State Championship trophy !!!! ! Class A - West Chester Henderson Warriors 4 Freeport Yellow Jackets 1 Class AA - Pine Richland Rams 4 Haverford High Fords 1 Class AAA - North Allegheny Tigers 6 Holy Ghost Prep Firebirds 3 ***GAME SUMMARIES*** ARE NOW AVAILABLE IN GAME SUMMARIES Visit the Ice Works by clcking on the title above !

Cleveland Lumberjacks Invitational Euclid, Ohio Erie McDowell (PA) 8 Dublin Coffman 2 Cleveland Heights 0 Dublin Jerome 4 Dublin Coffman 9 Cleveland Heights 0 Dublin Jerome 1 Erie McDowell (PA) 5 Erie McDowell (PA) 8 Cleveland Heights 0 Dublin Coffman 5 Dublin Jerome 1 Consolation Cleveland Heights 5 Dublin Jerome 3 Championship McDowell (PA) 3 Dublin Coffman 1 Congratulations to the McDowell Trojans - 2007 Cleveland Lumberjacks Champs

MEADVILLE - The Meadville Hockey Program started the Bulldog Invitational in 1996 to bring the best teams from Western Pennsylvania, Eastern Pennsylvania, Ohio and surrounding states to compete for three days at the ‘House of Chills’. The Bulldogs won their own tournament only once in 2003, which just happens to be the last time that they won the Pennsylvania Class AAA title. The Bulldogs are off to 9-3-0 start in League play and have shown periods of strength and weakness in that stretch, which historically includes play against non-league opponents, that Jamie Plunkett uses to hone the Dawgs run at State supremacy. In a non-league game earlier this season in mid-November in the National Invitational Scholastic Showcase in Jamestown NY, Meadville played arguably one of its best games of the season against Illinois power New Trier Green, but fell 4-3 giving up two shorthanded tallies in the third period. Coach Plunkett will tell you that these are the types of games that build playoff runs in March when you win them and toil in inconsistency in you don’t. The Bulldogs will have to start knocking off some contenders for Pennsylvania’s ultimate prize in the regular season or in non-league contests if it hopes to compete for the Penguins Cup and ultimately the Pennsylvania High School Hockey Championship at year’s end. LaSalle Head Coach Wally Muehbronner loves coming to Meadville to compete against excellent competition and has done so now for 8 years. The Explorers have expanded their horizons traveling to the Northeast to play in the Mount St Charles Invitational, which they did in late December to play against hockey powers from Rhode Island, Maine, New Hampshire among others and in addition compete against New Jersey Prep powers to hone their run at the Flyers Cup. Losses against Delbartan NJ, the Hill School and Wyoming Seminary were all close, but the Explorers have been pretty dominant in League play with a perfect record thus far and good enough to rank them # 1 in the recent Pa Hockey Elite 8 Flyers Cup poll and # 1 in the State of Pennsylvania in the same Elite 8 statewide poll. LaSalle is ranked ahead of Bethel Park, who beat the Dawgs in December at the ‘House of Chills’ 6-3. LaSalle showed no sign of bus legs in the opening period as they skated Meadville into the ground from the opening bell. The benefits started just 23 seconds into the contest as Ross Denczi crashed the net and poked home an Adam Berkle rebound to give the Explorers a 2-0 lead. LaSalle continued good transition play out of their zone and into Meadville’s and scored a beautiful goal at 9:54 as Tom Minton converted a great cross-ice pass from linemate Mark Schnupp to make it two zip. Minton would scored again at 4:57 of the 1st period on a weird angle shot from below the goal line which bounced off the back of Mike Licinski to make it 3-0. A critical penalty kill for Meadville in final two minutes of opening period negated LaSalle’s power play with a penalty against the Explorers with 18 seconds remaining, LaSalle dominated play in the opening period and the shots 12-4. After the ice cut and some words of encouragement from coach Plunkett we were on to the second period and the Bulldogs finally got on the board as Morgan Nickerson found Alex Drelick on a cross ice feed, who slipped a shot past Dan Pyne to get Meadville back in the hockey game at 12:32 at 3-1. Meadville was shorthanded in the 2nd period, but capitalized on an odd man break as Pat Leone fired a shot that Pyne with a little under 11 minutes to go in the middle period bringing the intimate but always boisterous House of Chills crowd to a thunderous roar making this a 3-2 contest. More penalty killing for Meadville with 9:06 to play in the 2nd, but the Dawgs adjustments lured LaSalle into the Meadville half ice game,which the home team excels at and the penalty was successfully killed. Another penalty with 3:39 remaining in the second period put LaSalle on the power play again. At some point the Explorers would need to capitalize on the Bulldog penalties and they did with 3:01 to go as Tom Minton’s shot trickled past Mike Licinski to give LaSalle a 4-2 and complete the hat trick for # 9 of LaSalle. With 14:33 to play in regulation, LaSalle took another penalty and Meadville had a 5 on 3 advantage for almost a minute, but the Explorers aggressive penalty kill prevailed. Meadville was able to get back in the game as Pat Leone banged home a rebound of an Alex Drelick backhand with 11:20 to play to cut the lead to 4-3, but took a penalty in the process putting LaSalle on the power play. With 9:47 to go, the Explorer’s made them pay as T.J. Laessig’s shot shot from the left point found its way through traffic and behind Licinski to make it a 5-3 count. The Explorers went on the power play with 5:46 to go in regulation with a five minute major assessed to the Bulldogs and they scored with 5:07 to go on a rebound goal by #12 Eric McLoughlin to extend the lead to 6-3. Meadville scored the games final goal as Aaron Nye scored on a slapshot from the left point with 2:15 to go, but Meadville ran out of clock as LaSalle earned a 6-4 victory at the House of Chills.

St Edwards 2 Mt Lebanon 0 2007 Meadville Bulldog Invitational MEADVILLE - After Mt Lebanon lost to Sylvania Northview 3-1 in the 2007 Meadville Bulldog Invitational opener, head coach Paul Taibi called a midnight practice with his team to remind them the commitment it takes when you are defending Pennsylvania Class AAA State Champions. After the Blue Devils lost to Bethel Park a week ago, coach Taibi was less than satisfied with the effort of his team, but turned it around in three days and earned a 2-2 tie against the Blackhawks. Consistency is one of the toughest feats for a team who aspires to be champions. And while everyone is entitled to a bad game here and there, there is no excuse for lack of effort and coach Taibi has a tradition at Mt Lebanon of hard working and well prepared squads and he sees the potential for the Blue Devils to make noise in March. A coining process after Lebo’s impressive 2-0 victory over a very good Gilmour Academy team limiting the Lancers to just 10 shots on goal. So Lebo 66 who won the Bulldog a year ago is now Lebo 49 a/k/a Lebo 46, who are not half the team they used to be. Whatever percentage you would like to assign, Mt Lebanon is working toward defending their title, both at the Bulldog and the Pennsylvania Class AAA crown they earned a year ago. St Edwards from Cleveland is a perennial power of Ohio Interscholastic Hockey winning 10 Ohio State Championships. Head coach Rob Whidden is in a battle in Cleveland for supremacy with defending Ohio champions Padua with the goal of ending in Columbus the second week in March. The Eagles rebounded from an opening loss in the Bulldog Invitational to upend Sylvania Northview 2-0 and the bracket is now wide open with the winners of Saturday’s contests advancing along with LaSalle and Toledo St Francis to the semi-finals. St Edward’s opened the scoring at 11:56 of the first period on a goal by Charles Wisniewski to give the Eagles a 1-0 lead, which they held through the first period. Mt Lebanon went on the power play at 8:24 of the 2nd period, but the Eagles killed it maintaining a 1-0 lead. St Ed’s went on the power play at 6:27 and could not score. Mt Lebanon would have another chance at 4:10. The Eagles seized control of the hockey game at 7:40 as Charles Wisnewski’s shot from sharp angle beat Robbie Behling on the short side to give St Ed’s a 2-0 advantage. Lebo 46 was now in an uphill climb needing 3 goals over the games final 7 ½ minutes, which has been the Achilles heel of the Blue Devils and a favorite Sunday Conversation of Dr Denton (off on assignment in Cleveland) and King Tut. With 3:33 to go the Lebo power play would have one last gasp and St Ed’s goaltender Everett Graves made two nice stops of Jon Wilen with 2:23 to play. The Blue Devils penalty shortly thereafter was the death nail for Lebo as St Edwards would now advance to play Toledo St Francis in tomorrow’s semi-finals and LaSalle will face Sylvania Northview. Mt Lebanon outshot St Ed’s 23-18. The loss will bring an end to the two year run of Mt Lebanon and LaSalle meeting for the Bulldog Invitational title.

For those of us new to Pa Hockey, you will find below the scores of every game played within the past week and the schedule of those upcoming games. The feature you will find nowhere else but here on Pa Hockey is the Highlights and Game Summaries. Just click on the score of the game when posted and if 'Highlights' [H] and ***GAME SUMMARIES*** are provided, this is the most up to date account of the Western Pa Hockey scores. If you would like to see an individual teams schedule with all of the results throughout the season, click on SCHEDULES and find your favorite team OR go to the TEAM WEBSITES section and find them as well. To find the most updated and accurate Standings, just click on OVERALL STANDINGS and choose AAA, AA, A or OPEN. Thanks for your support of Pa Hockey............Pennsylvania's # 1 Interscholastic Hockey Website !