Baldwin Highlanders - 1975 & 1988 AAA

2005 Penguins Cup AAA ~ North Allegheny Tigers vs Bethel Park Blackhawks MELLON ARENA - North Allegheny coach Tom Pandolfo has played this game in his mind ever since he took the helm over the Tiger program last season. The classic underachievers over the 32 years of North Allegheny hockey has been that the program has the resources in players and the desire of the people, what it needed and has found is a leader in their coach and a collective leadership of their players, which has carried the Tigers for the 1st time ever in to the 2005 Penguins Cup finals and an opportunity to move on and play Malvern Prep on Saturday at the Hersheypark Arena in the 30th Pennsylvania High School Hockey Championship. In the way is Bethel Park, a team the Tigers defeated for the 2004-05 Pa Hockey Scholastic Showcase Director’s Cup in December 5-1 and followed up with a 4-1 regular season 4-1 victory at Bethel Park Blade Runners in February. So Na knows they can beat Bethel and will have to prove it on the big stage of the Mellon Arena with some big stakes in a Penguins Cup title on the line. Bethel Park has been to the dance in 1997, 2000, 2001 and 2002 and went on to win the Pennsylvania four times over Malvern Prep 4-3 at Iceline, over Father Judge 3-2 at the Mellon Arena, Malvern Prep 2-1 at Haverford Skatium and Malvern Prep 4-3 in overtime at the Rostraver Ice Garden. Guess who the winner of the 2005 Penguins Cup gets in the 2005 State Championship…..you got it Malvern Prep defeated a very good Germantown Academy 4-3 team for their 5th consecutive Flyers Cup last Thursday at the Spectrum and a chance to defend their State Title from a year ago. This would set up the first meeting between Malvern and Bethel since the Rostraver stick measurement game. Jim ‘Mort’ McVay just wants that opportunity and has a big roadblock ahead of his team in the form of North Allegheny, who surpassed the Hawks in the standings and the rankings in December. So a large task which has been a mighty defending champ Meadville in 1997 by a 3-2 score, a rough Cathedral Prep squad in a hostile environment in Erie 5-4 in 2000, Cinderella Allderdice 7-3 in Johnstown in 2001 and archrival Mt Lebanon 3-1 at the Mellon Arena in 2002. So Mort knows the adversity of a strong opponent and knows how to prepare to defeat them and now has another one in NA. The first opportunity of the game came at 7:23 as Bethel Park went on the power play but could not score. A very mundane and boring first period with tight checking and an 8-3 shot advantage for the Tigers. At 12:52 of the 2nd the Waldschmidt’s of Garrett then Wes went to work to give NA a lead and it was Bryce Merriam who answered with two great saves. An excellent play by Michael Diethorn but may have been a little too much agressive, put NA on the power with a little over 11 minutes left in the middle period. The Blackhawks dug in defensively and did a great job shutting down the dangerous Tiger power play and the game remained scoreless. At 8:09, Bryce Merriam made an unreal save on Wes Waldschmidt with the glove which brought the Bethel fans to their feet as he stacked the pads and snagged a wicked wrister. Then at 5:57, the Bethel fans prayers were answered as the dangerous Timmy O’Brien got loose and scored on his own rebound to give the Hawks a 1-0 lead despite being outshot 18-7. Now to the mentality as the Tigers surrendered their first goal of the playoffs. Now to the mentality of this game as the Tigers now trailed for the first time in the playoffs and with 3:05 left Wes Waldschmidt was throttled to boards with a clean hit and the question is what would the Tigers do now that one of their main offensive pieces went down, but Waldschmidt was able to get up under his own power. And the game continued and Bethel was whistled again with 2:38 left putting the Tigers on the power play and a golden opportunity in what may be a real low scoring game to tie it. With 1:29, Brian McGinty was pulled down and it could have very well been a penalty shot, but ended up being hooking and a 4 on 4 . With a 26-1-0 record for the season and 26 wins in a row, its hard to believe the Tigers are now 15 minutes and another hot Bryce Merriam period away from being eliminated. But it’s true and have only given up one goal as part of the process. Welcome to the world of the quest to win a State Championship and Jim McVay to this point has coached a brilliant game of text book Bethel hockey with defense and the goaltending of Merriam, which he knew would be a key and has happened to plan thus far. This could go down as a classic, but a long way to go in the final period of regulation. The hole got al little deeper for the Tigers with 12:53 left as Bethel went on the power play. Tick . Tick. Tick. on the Tigers season. With around 9:00 to go another Merriam save on Matt Zrebiec and still 1-0. As NA shortened the bench, coach McVay kept running 4 lines and fresh players, who play position, with relentless determination and defensive prowess. Tick. Tick. Tick. With 5:29 Merriam stopped Paul Dittrich and made it look easy. With 3:01 left coach Tom Pandolfo called timeout and time stood still on the Tiger’s season down 1-0. With 2:27, Matt Pekins with a snapshot and Merriam handled it. A flurry with under two left and Bethel survived. The recipe was desperation for both teams under a minute and Bethel Park stood tall against the giant and in a classic finish the Hawks would move on to play Malvern and for NA, who only gave up one goal, would go home. For Bethel Park and its coach the banquet would be next Friday in Hershey and coach McVay, who maybe will get a little more encouragement and gets to face a Malvern team, who will defend their title, but has never beaten the Blackhawks in the State Final.