It’s funny what a couple hours in a hockey rink can do to
change a mood or situation. We’ve all
been to the games where heading in you think you are going to get destroyed and…a
few hours later you walk out feeling pretty good. Unfortunately the converse is also true – Everett
arena last February against Concord comes to mind. However tonight’s game featured a team about
whom it was hard to have a strong feeling either way heading in. Sure the Windham Jaguars were making their
NHIAA Division 1 debut after moving up from Division 2 last year. Sure, they had only tied Exeter 3-3. But they had also lost to Bedford by a only a
4-2 margin (sound familiar Marauders fans?) and had actually beat, yes beat,
the evil empire BG Cardinals already in divisional play.
So into Campion Arena came the 5-3 Jaguars to face off
against the 6-1 (7-3 overall) Hanover Marauders in a Saturday night tilt that
was heavily overshadowed by the prospect of a heavy storm arriving any
minute. In fact the prospect of the
storm dumping major snow had all involved wondering if the game would even
happen - 2 hours later I’m sure the
Jaguars wish it hadn’t as Dick Dodds’s squad put on a controlled domination of
the upstarts with a 4-0 win.
Opening up in the first, it was clear that Hanover had the
upper hand and perhaps some 2 hour bus legs and playing the defending Division
1 state championships had something to do with it. However, despite pounding away at the lobby
side goal, the locals could not hit the twine until over 10 minutes had already
gone by. And like so many times before,
and certainly as we would see in this game, it was the special teams that would
make the difference. On the man-up at 10:33, it was Spencer Lawe finding the net
on a high circle wrister on passes from Hans Williams and Charlie Plottner to
make it 1-0. And then the wheels fell
off the proverbial bus for these Jaguars (Blake Bortles redux) and in lightning
succession, Charlie Plottner picked off a pass at the blue line finding Sylas
Oberting in front whose rebound was put back by Cam Woods to make it 2-0 at
13:14 and then on the man-up at 14:10 Matty Gardner’s wall pass from behind the
net found Oberting on the high far circle and his one-timer made it 3-0 to end
the first (sorry about the run-on sentence but I got excited about the
offensive outburst and did not have time for proper grammar).
One half expected Windham to come out firing in the second,
but much like the first period, Hanover just maintained control – killing penalties,
creating neutral zone turnovers, and frustrating the Windham bench with a nice
Division 1 welcome. Brendan Brigham
helped with that welcome when he got deep in the Jaguar zone and put an exclamation
point on the 4-0 win with assists going to Toño Correa and Gardner at 9:54. And with that, Division 2 looked like a lot
more fun - maybe next time you come to the Upper Valley Jaguars give Lebanon High
a try.
So into the third it went and with lots of playing time
going around, the Jaguars came close several times only to be stoned by Ben
Plottner whose 19 saves preserved the shutout.
And just like Pat Sajak with his contestants on Wheel of Fortune, Oberting
offered a nice parting gift deep in the third with his defensive zone check
that could be heard even over the sound of the Windham bus driver warming up the bus outside.
With the win, Hanover moves to 7-1 in NHIAA play and is
locked into a second place tie with Concord and Pinkerton with an away rematch
against Trinity coming up on Wednesday.
Enjoy the snow Marauders, and before you go skiing tomorrow, make sure
there is nothing in your contracts preventing you from doing so. See you at the rink.
BTW: I watched the entire game on Livebarn and the feed is
absolutely fantastic from Campion. Plus
you can watch archived game footage – so sign up!
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