Peters Twp Indians - 2014 AAA 2002-2003-2005 AA

NEW KENSINGTON ~ Keith Kearney has done a wonderful job in rebuilding the Fox Chapel program and bringing into first place in the East Division and has three solid lines, which have helped the Foxes to a 13-1-1 record and looking like a contender for the Penguins Cup. The solid goaltending of Senior Todd Hendry makes the Foxes an even more interesting team and FC has beaten some pretty good teams recently like Central Catholic, Butler and Plum. That is all great, but in order to be a contender you must beat one and my opinion for most of the season, which has been validated lately is that Mt Lebanon and Meadville are the favorites entering the playoffs, which is a little over a month away period. So this would be a big test for the Foxes and without getting into a long drawn out discussion about a certain player’s [who is a sophomore in high school’s] dreams, I will just simply state that NO team in Class AAA can win the Pennsylvania State Championship with a rent-a-player and the only one in recent memory who won a State Championship with them is Peters Twp in 2002 and 2003 and that team could have won it with me between the pipes. So trudging along is Jamie Plunkett, the Dean of Coaching of Interscholastic Scholastic Hockey in the State of Pennsylvania, whose Bulldogs will be looking to defend their State Championship from a year ago and has eight Pennsylvania Class AAA State Championships. Plunkett has retired many of opposing coaches into the amateur ranks, who wouldn’t play the Bulldogs because they couldn’t beat them and now these guys portray themselves as procurement specialists of ‘the Dream’. Maybe no one has ever heard of Ryan Smart, who walked right out of Meadville High School and played four years for Cornell University and then was drafted by the New Jersey Devils. He played four years for the Dawgs and picked up a few State Championship rings along the way, so anyone who tells me about the ‘Dream’ has never won a State Championship for their school. Meadville has re-written the book on it, Mt Lebanon is a contender for it and North Allegheny is working on it and Fox Chapel is # 4, until the beat somebody in the top 3. So what should have been a packed house at Harmarville, turned into an intimate gathering at the new Valley Sports Center and Adam Petrovitch had a great opportunity on a Bulldog turnover at 14:03, but was turned aside by Danny O’Sharuk. Fox Chapel’s Jason Kreps would put the Foxes on top on a great individual effort at 12:52 as he walked around the Meadville defense and shoved the puck past O’Sharuk for a 1-0 lead. Coach Kearney did a lot of line juggling in the opening period, but the guy they were trying to stop burned them as Christian Nickerson found the rebound at the 9:00 mark and poked it past Hendry for a tie game. O’Sharuk stopped Justin Kreps from point blank range at 8:37 to keep the game tied. The thing that make Meadville so dangerous that they get scoring from everyone in the lineup and hard working Shawn Harbaugh was the recipient of a great cross crease pass from Tyler ‘the forgotten one’ Learn and Harbaugh buried a shot down on the ice to give the Dawgs a 2-1 lead at 3:24. Fox Chapel had power plays late in the first and three more in the second, but something was missing on the Foxes power play as they managed only 8 shots and let a golden opportunity to seize this one slip away. Meadville on the other hand had some great defensive play and excellent penalty killing namely from Christian Nickerson, David Moyer, Nate Licinski and Phil Siverd to keep the lead at 2-1. On to the third period and the Bulldogs kept Fox Chapel at bay limiting the usually high powered Foxes to just 3 shots while pressuring Fox Chapel with twelve of their own for a shot advantage of 33-22 on the evening. Meadville finally found the knockout punch as David Moyer buried a slapshot on the ice through the 5-hole of Todd Hendry to give the Bulldogs a 3-1 lead with 6:51 remaining. Meadville controlled the play and the clock the rest of the way forcing Fox Chapel into undisciplined penalties and picked up a key 3-1 win over once, now twice beaten Fox Chapel. The dream lives and it took it show up Interstate 79 in preparation for another run !

NEW KENSINGTON ~ Keith Kearney has done a wonderful job in rebuilding the Fox Chapel program and bringing into first place in the East Division and has three solid lines, which have helped the Foxes to a 13-1-1 record and looking like a contender for the Penguins Cup. The solid goaltending of Senior Todd Hendry makes the Foxes an even more interesting team and FC has beaten some pretty good teams recently like Central Catholic, Butler and Plum. That is all great, but in order to be a contender you must beat one and my opinion for most of the season, which has been validated lately is that Mt Lebanon and Meadville are the favorites entering the playoffs, which is a little over a month away period. So this would be a big test for the Foxes and without getting into a long drawn out discussion about a certain player’s [who is a sophomore in high school’s] dreams, I will just simply state that NO team in Class AAA can win the Pennsylvania State Championship with a rent-a-player and the only one in recent memory who won a State Championship with them is Peters Twp in 2002 and 2003 and that team could have won it with me between the pipes. So trudging along is Jamie Plunkett, the Dean of Coaching of Interscholastic Scholastic Hockey in the State of Pennsylvania, whose Bulldogs will be looking to defend their State Championship from a year ago and has eight Pennsylvania Class AAA State Championships. Plunkett has retired many of opposing coaches into the amateur ranks, who wouldn’t play the Bulldogs because they couldn’t beat them and now these guys portray themselves as procurement specialists of ‘the Dream’. Maybe no one has ever heard of Ryan Smart, who walked right out of Meadville High School and played four years for Cornell University and then was drafted by the New Jersey Devils. He played four years for the Dawgs and picked up a few State Championship rings along the way, so anyone who tells me about the ‘Dream’ has never won a State Championship for their school. Meadville has re-written the book on it, Mt Lebanon is a contender for it and North Allegheny is working on it and Fox Chapel is # 4, until the beat somebody in the top 3. So what should have been a packed house at Harmarville, turned into an intimate gathering at the new Valley Sports Center and Adam Petrovitch had a great opportunity on a Bulldog turnover at 14:03, but was turned aside by Danny O’Sharuk. Fox Chapel’s Jason Kreps would put the Foxes on top on a great individual effort at 12:52 as he walked around the Meadville defense and shoved the puck past O’Sharuk for a 1-0 lead. Coach Kearney did a lot of line juggling in the opening period, but the guy they were trying to stop burned them as Christian Nickerson found the rebound at the 9:00 mark and poked it past Hendry for a tie game. O’Sharuk stopped Justin Kreps from point blank range at 8:37 to keep the game tied. The thing that make Meadville so dangerous that they get scoring from everyone in the lineup and hard working Shawn Harbaugh was the recipient of a great cross crease pass from Tyler ‘the forgotten one’ Learn and Harbaugh buried a shot down on the ice to give the Dawgs a 2-1 lead at 3:24. Fox Chapel had power plays late in the first and three more in the second, but something was missing on the Foxes power play as they managed only 8 shots and let a golden opportunity to seize this one slip away. Meadville on the other hand had some great defensive play and excellent penalty killing namely from Christian Nickerson, David Moyer, Nate Licinski and Phil Siverd to keep the lead at 2-1. On to the third period and the Bulldogs kept Fox Chapel at bay limiting the usually high powered Foxes to just 3 shots while pressuring Fox Chapel with twelve of their own for a shot advantage of 33-22 on the evening. Meadville finally found the knockout punch as David Moyer buried a slapshot on the ice through the 5-hole of Todd Hendry to give the Bulldogs a 3-1 lead with 6:51 remaining. Meadville controlled the play and the clock the rest of the way forcing Fox Chapel into undisciplined penalties and picked up a key 3-1 win over once, now twice beaten Fox Chapel. The dream lives and it took it show up Interstate 79 in preparation for another run !

NEW KENSINGTON ~ The Johnstown hockey program has hit the skids in the late 1990’s and into the 21st century and coach Tom Rizzo’s squad has improved to two victories in Class A, but considering how weak Class A hockey is this season, its hard to measure the improvement. An opportunity is the form of winless Valley presented itself for the Trojans. Valley, on the other hand, had one of its best outings of the year against a ranked team in Richland-Cambria before the Rams finally took control in the 3rd period and defeated the Vikings 6-2. In fact, although winless Valley has put up a pretty good battle with some of the better teams in Class A and maybe this would be the night the Vikings could break their 0-14-0 season and put a victory on the board. The first period was evenly played as the Vikings held a 9-8 shot advantage and took the lead late in the period as Anthony Perriello scored on the power play at 3:42 to give Valley a 1-0 lead. Perriello set up linemate Dave Roberts only twenty seconds late to extend the lead to 2-0. The Vikings were in rarified air at 7:01 of the second as Perriello added his 2nd goal on an assist from Roberts with a shorthanded tally for a 3-0 Viking lead. When Brandon Gazzo scored at 5:14, the Vikings were on their way to victory. Johnstown’s Marcus Botteicher broke Logan Harding’s shutout bid at 10:05 of the 3rd as Valley outshot Johnstown 32-20 on the evening and picked up their first victory of the season 4-1 over the Trojans. Special Thanks to Kevin Keller for this report

NEW KENSINGTON ~ The Johnstown hockey program has hit the skids in the late 1990’s and into the 21st century and coach Tom Rizzo’s squad has improved to two victories in Class A, but considering how weak Class A hockey is this season, its hard to measure the improvement. An opportunity is the form of winless Valley presented itself for the Trojans. Valley, on the other hand, had one of its best outings of the year against a ranked team in Richland-Cambria before the Rams finally took control in the 3rd period and defeated the Vikings 6-2. In fact, although winless Valley has put up a pretty good battle with some of the better teams in Class A and maybe this would be the night the Vikings could break their 0-14-0 season and put a victory on the board. The first period was evenly played as the Vikings held a 9-8 shot advantage and took the lead late in the period as Anthony Perriello scored on the power play at 3:42 to give Valley a 1-0 lead. Perriello set up linemate Dave Roberts only twenty seconds late to extend the lead to 2-0. The Vikings were in rarified air at 7:01 of the second as Perriello added his 2nd goal on an assist from Roberts with a shorthanded tally for a 3-0 Viking lead. When Brandon Gazzo scored at 5:14, the Vikings were on their way to victory. Johnstown’s Marcus Botteicher broke Logan Harding’s shutout bid at 10:05 of the 3rd as Valley outshot Johnstown 32-20 on the evening and picked up their first victory of the season 4-1 over the Trojans. Special Thanks to Kevin Keller for this report

1/17/04 ~ Meadville defeats undermanned TJ, win proves costly ! Meadville ~ BULLDOG INVITATIONAL Meadville, the # 3 Class AAA team in Pennsylvania met Thomas Jefferson, the # 1 AA team in Pennsylvania. Meadville was looking to advance into the semi-final round to defend its 2003 Bulldog Invitational title, while the Jaguars were trying to survive without leading scorers Luke Wawrzeniak, Brandon School and Derek Kelly. Although TJ put up a valiant effort through 2 ½ periods, Meadville took control of this one as Phil Siverd registered the hat trick and Evan Wisinski score twice in a 7-1 win for the Bulldogs. The win proved costly as Meadville’s leading scorer Christian Nickerson was ejected from tournament play late in the third period of a 6-1 game. 1/17/04 ~ Meadville peaks a little and soundly defeats LaSalle Meadville ~ BULLDOG INVITATIONAL Meadville, the # 3 Class AAA team in Pennsylvania and 2-0 in the Invitational met LaSalle, the # 4 Class AAA team in Pennsylvania and also 2-0 in the Bulldog. Both teams were looking to advance and claim the # 1 seed in their bracket into the semi-final round of the 2004 Bulldog Invitational. Meadville, playing without Christian Nickerson, played an inspired game as Rick Thomas scored two goals and David Moyer, Anthony Scarpino and Phil Siverd scored singles. L.G Gatson and John Williams scored for the Explorers, who had plenty of chances but were denied by Danny O’Sharuk, who made several key saves in the second and third periods to preserve the victory. 1/18/04 ~ Malvern shows why they are # 1 in Pennsylvania Meadville ~ BULLDOG INVITATIONAL Malvern Prep, the # 1 Class AAA team in Pennsylvania met archrival LaSalle, the # 4 Class AAA team in Pennsylvania in the Bulldog Invitational. The Friars entered the playoff round with impressive wins over Sylvania Northview 8-3, Cleveland St Ignatius 3-2 and a 6-1 drumming of Central Catholic. LaSalle defeated Thomas Jefferson 5-0 and Toledo St Francis before bowing to Meadville 5-2. Malvern flexed their muscles in this one with a 4-0 victory over the Explorers as freshman Bryan Mountain picked up the shutout stopping all 19 shots he faced. The Friar scoring machine for coach John Graves of Justin Martin, Chris Campanale, Tim Gehring and Warren Byrne scored and Malvern, the 2002 Bulldog champion, claimed a spot in the Bulldog Invitational finals waiting for the winner of 2003 champion Meadville and three-time Bulldog champion [1999,2000 & 2001] Cleveland St Ignatius. 1/18/04 ~ St Ignatius has the magic in Bulldog & beats Meadville Meadville ~ BULLDOG INVITATIONAL Meadville, the # 3 Class AAA team in Pennsylvania met Cleveland St Ignatius for the right to face Malvern Prep in the Bulldog Invitational final. Meadville may have been caught looking ahead a little, while the Wildcats were looking forward to a rematch of an outstanding preliminary round 3-2 contest with Malvern Prep. St Ignatius was impressive in this semi-final as Nick Anderson scored twice for the Wildcats with single scores from Jack Ubbing, Kevin Colleran and Chris Schmoldt. The Wildcats Ted Riolo faced only 12 Meadville shots as Anthony Scarpino’s second period tally was the only highlight for the Bulldogs. The Wildcats advanced to their 5th Bulldog Invitational final in 8 years to face Malvern Prep.