Seneca Valley Raiders

DELMONT – Norwin coach Dave Warren began this season with promise as Senior goaltender Steve Bell was outstanding in a 2-0 opening loss to Shaler with 35 saves and the Knights evened their record with a 10-3 pummeling of Woodland Hills. Bad news came when Bell was injured and his status is uncertain, bad timing as Norwin would have to face a very offensive minded Butler club. Butler is off to its best start since the mid-1990’s when the Toronadoes had a run of five straight winning seasons including a Penguin Cup Elite 8 appearance before losing to eventual Penguin Cup champion Central Catholic. Coach Bob Hoehn took the night off as he was out of town on business, but his offense did not. Budding superstars Spencer Crouse and Greg Rogerson led the way for the Golden Toronadoes as Butler smashed Norwin outshooting them 44-12 and shelling Norwin’s Michael Pochan for a 10-0 whitewash. Crouse scored four times and Rogerson added a pair of goals and a pair of assists. Butler also received a strong game from Brian Rogers with two goals, Jared White with 4 assists and B.J. Tipton with 3 assists. Bucky Holt had an easy shutout for Butler. The honeymoon will end as the Golden Toronadoes will face defending State Champion Meadville Wednesday at the Belmont and put their 3-0-0 record on the line.

HARMARVILLE - Special Report to Pa Hockey provided by Mt Lebanon Hockey ! # 1 Central Catholic faced off # 2 Mt Lebanon faced off in an early season battle for the top spot in Class AAA. Lebo struck first as Mike Jordan scored an early a power play goal putting in the rebound off a Tony Valerino shot from the slot to give Lebo a 1-0 lead. Pgh CC came right back with a PP goal of their own as Mike McGurk blasted one through traffic from the point to tie the game at 1-1. With :31 seconds left in the 1st period Eric Sloan took a perfect pass from Dan Wilen who was behind the net and beat Bryan Adamczak on the short side to give Lebo a 2-1 after 1 period. With 5 minutes to go in the 2nd Tony Valerino broke down the right side and slipped one past Adamczak to regain Lebo's 2 goal lead at 3-1 but CC came back again less than a minute later as Bill Freyvogel beat Matt Vaughan through the legs due to the hard work behind the net of Ryan Gerber and CC was back in it after 2 periods trailing 3-2. The all important 'next goal' was scored midway through the 3rd as Chad Uddstrom took a pass from Eric Sloan and beat Adamczak on a wrap around to give Lebo a 4-2. With CC pressing in the Lebo zone Matt Capalonga was called for a penalty and Ed Martin was given a misconduct and a game misconduct. Lebo then put the game away as Chad Uddstrom buried a Bill Leckenby rebound to give Lebo a 5-2 victory. Final shots on goal were Lebo = 23 CC = 14

DELMONT – Fox Chapel coach Keith Kearney knows his team is achieving a lot of firsts this season as they defeated Bethel Park last week to move ahead of the Hawks, Meadville and Cathedral Prep in the Elite 8 rankings. The Foxes have seen just about enough of Franklin Regional as they have defeated the Panthers twice this season in tournament action and would face them a third time in the regular season. Franklin Regional coach Jim Damp knows his team is working extremely hard, but needs that one additional boost to win the close games. Their gamebreaker Jimmie Daugherty looks to be sidelined for a while and the Panthers hope to have their leader back for another playoff run in February. Needless to say their infamous 21st man was their on crutches to root on his team against FC along with a racious group of Franklin students. Joe Budz continued to have the hot hand as he redirected home a Matt Quigley pass at 9:11 of the first period for a 1-0 Fox Chapel lead. Franklin took advantage of a Foxes miscue as Mark Gigliotti pulled the puck around a fallin down FC defenseman and wlaked down the slot and buried a wrister past Todd Hendry for a tie game at 1-1 with 2:14 left in the first. Fox Chapel came out physical in the second and coach Kearney’s move of Jason Kreps to offense paid off as he beat Chris Fonzi on the backhand as Quigley ran interference on the Panther defense at 13:17 for a 2-1 FC lead. Kreps just missed a 2nd goal as he just deflected a tip wide on a give and go with Dan Thiessen at 10:42. It didn’t take long after that for Fox Chapel to score as Ryan McDonald celebrated his return to the team with a beautiful goal as he walked off the boards and beat Fonzi upstairs at 10:03 to extend the lead to 3-1. Matt Quigley showed why many consider him one of the most dangerous players in Class AAA as he outraced the Franklin defense to the puck and in one motion backhanded a pass to Budz, who beat Fonzi on the backhand and all the sudden Fox Chapel was in control at 7:58 of the middle period 4-1. The Panthers picked up the pace and continued to pressure Todd Hendry outshooting the Foxes 24-13 through two periods. On to the third period and Franklin fed off their excellent work in the last 5 minutes of the 2nd and it paid off, as ‘Bugs Bunny’ or the ‘Eveready Bunny’, you take your choice, Luke Baughman made a great play with a move on the forehand beating the FC defense and Hendry to cut the lead to 4-2 at 10:22. Franklin stepped up the pressure on FC outshooting them 17-4 in the final period as they went on the power play at 9:40, which was killed by the Foxes. After a freak bounce in the Fox Chapel zone, Lou Levine found the puck in the slot and poked it past Hendry and all the sudden with 5:39 left it was now 4-3. Franklin looked to be in trouble as the Panthers took a penalty with 2:49 left, but FR killed the penalty and looked to tie the game with under a minute to play. Fox Chapel would be challenged and it would take goaltender Todd Hendry to make two big saves in the games final seconds as he robbed David Hopper with 4 seconds left and may have got a piece of Joe Ferraro’s shot which hit the post at the buzzer to preserve a 4-3 Fox Chapel win and a perfect 3-0-0 record.

CASTLE SHANNON - Allderdice is one of the original ‘six’ high school hockey programs along with Churchill [now part of Woodland Hills], Mt Lebanon, Penn Hills, Upper St. Clair and West Mifflin North in 1970-1971, which was an exhibition season prior to the forming of the WPIHL [which was known at the time as the Western Pennsylvania High School Hockey League]. The Dragons have fielded a Varsity team for every year but one in 1984-1985 and the amazing part of their history is that they have a very respectable 305-342-43 record with a Penguin Cup AA Championship in 1988 and most recently a Penguin Cup AAA Finalist appearance in 2001. So they discussion goes on as the remnants of the Dice Penguin Cup team have graduated and now faced with the discussion of whether to field a Varsity in 2003-2004, so Adam Billingsley, whose father kept the Allderdice program afloat for a better part of five years in the mid-to-late 1990’s on a shoestring, has been called upon to guide a very inexperienced group of Dragons through the rough terrain of a division with the Bethel Park’s, the Upper St. Clair’s, Mt Lebanon’s, Baldwin’s and Central Catholic’s in Class AAA. The Allderdice bench always looks the same going back to the Buddy Martin and Dee Rizzo era in the 1970’s through the Dickie Rizzo era in the 1980’s and the Andrew Dealy led Penguin Cup team in 2001, a handful of players still don the Green, Blue and White and go out to represent the City League in Hockey. Connellsville, enters its eighth season of existence with a 7-172-3 record and is coming off a 2-22-0 season in 2002-2003. The debate about Connellsville was from the beginning as to if it ever should have fielded a Varsity team in 1995-1996 until it had developed a Junior Varsity and Freshman team, but the program has survived solely due to the beautiful Ice Mine facility it plays in at Divito Park. Former Penn Hills superstar Jeff Fleck, who played for the Indians as an 8th grader in the early 1980’s and then went on to play at Hotchkiss, a prestigious Prep School in New England, is in his first year as a Head Coach after stints at Penn Hills and Woodland Hills, may be the perfect fit to put the Falcons on track to finally developing a hockey program and early in this season …..the unthinkable words have been spoken….now come on every …..all at once …..Playoffs!… Now that wasn’t so hard…was it ?. A big opening night thrashing of Woodland Hills and a near overtime loss to North Hills has a buzz around Falcon land. With my faithful assistant Billy Zuri on hand for the late game at the Ice Castle, vying to regain Top 5 fan status again…..the Dragons and Falcons took to the ice to renew some fun from a game a year ago in Connellsville, which apparently ended in high spirits, fights, some heated words, but no suspensions, which is par for the course for the PIHL and its look the other way selective discipline policy. Connellsville came out in the first period looking for win # 2 as Jacon Burncheck converted a Michael Brooks pass at 6:44 to give the Falcons a 1-0 lead. Veteran Connellsville player Michael Schmidle smelled paydirt as he buried a wrist shot on the short side over the shoulder of John Luxbacher for a 2-0 advantage with just :41 left in the opening period. Allderdice came back in the second benefiting from a two man advantage as Drew Brown scored on a long slapshot past the stick side of Craig Cordaro at 13:42 to cut the lead to 2-1. The Dragons struck less than a minute later as Steve Deveraux found a loose puck and beat Cordaro on the short side to tie the game at two apiece at 12:55. Connellsville reclaimed the lead as Anthony Vilella slammed home a rebound at 6:57 to give the Falcons a 3-2 advantage. Coach Fleck has been stressing discipline and told his team to concentrate on playing hockey in the 3rd period and avoid the nonsense. The Falcons responded and Keith Cordaro walked down the slot and beat Luxbacher at 14:10 for a very important insurance tally and a 4-2 lead. The Dice came unglued and began taking penalties resulting in a 5 on 3, which spelled trouble as the Falcons Jeremy Burncheck took a great feed from Schmidle and made no mistake to give Connellsville a 5-2 lead. The Falcons put an exclamation point on a big win as Keith Cordaro converted on the power play after some nice work by linemates Nathan Romesburg and Jacob Shelkey at 9:03 to give Connellsville an impressive 6-2 victory and a hope of playoffs for the first time in Falconland. The Falcons outshot the Dice on the evening 57-23.

CASTLE SHANNON - South Park coach Bob Juha was looking to set the record straight for a late season loss in 2003 to Thomas Jefferson, which was a turning point in the Eagles season. SP opened up with an impressive win over two time State Champion Peters Twp and a pasting of Carrick for a 2-0-0 start. The Eagles would need an extraordinary effort as it faced the # 1 ranked team in Class AA Thomas Jefferson, The Jaguars took to the ice with a perfect record coming off a hard fought win over Indiana on Monday night. Tenured Head Coach Don Powell knows he has some horses and is looking forward to March this year, but also has enough saavy and experience to keep his group focused on the task at hand which would be long time rival South Park before a festive packed house at the Ice Castle. TJ’s Billy Barrett got things started for the Jags as he found a loose puck down low and walked to the net and beat SP’s netminder Ian Artim on the backhand at 11:03 for a 1-0 lead. South Park went on the power play at 10:20, but Barrett had the best scoring chance but was stopped by Artim on the breakaway at 9:10. Thomas Jefferson really picked up the pace in the middle of the opening period but Artim made several nice saves to keep it a one goal game. Eric Holzer picked up a rebound of a shot by Zach Hanbury and deposited into an empty net with just :12 remaining for a huge goal and a 2-0 Jaguar lead after some excellent puck movement by the black and gold. On to the 2nd and after TJ’s Danny Hartman made a nice stop on Tim Ryan a minute and a half earlier, the Eagles turned up the heat on TJ and made it count as Jared Miley found a loose puck and beat Hartman at 11:15 to cut the lead to 2-1. South Park thought they had tied the game at 10:59, but the whistle blew the play dead and the score remained 2-1 in favor of Thomas Jefferson. Billy Barrett extended the TJ lead at 6:37 converted a Brandon School pass from in front to make it 3-1. The Jaguars weren’t done as Zach Hanbury avoided a SP defender and fed Rob Heinhauer, who beat Artim on the far side for a 4-1 Jaguar lead at 5:44. Then TJ turned to their money man between the pipes as Danny Hartman made a great stop on Dennis Fleming and robbed Donny Remlinger on the rebound with a sprawling save with 2:02 left in the 2nd. SP came right back with another chance but Hartman stopped a backhand attempt by Tim Ryan and then calmly gloved the rebound shot by the towering Eagle Matt Slogan with just :36 remaining in the middle period. South Park needed to score on the power play at 11:19 to hold hope of any comeback but TJ killed the advantage to keep the score 4-1. The Jaguars effectively worked the puck down low in the Eagle zone and killed the clock and Hartman shut the door for a 4-1 Thomas Jefferson victory and a stronghold on the # 1 ranking in Class AA