Bedford skates past H/B in quarterfinals

Friday, March 12, 2010

Photo by David Beach Bedford's Michael Ahern, left, and Hollis/Brookline's Conor Venuti battle it out.

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Correspondent photo by DAVID BEACH Bedford High School’s Douglas Steere, left, and Luke McDonough try to get the puck past Hollis/Brookline High School goalie Jake Kobylarz.

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Photo by David Beach Hollis/Brookline captain Patrick Clark with the back handed assist.

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Photo by David Beach Bedford captain Douglas Steere faces off against William Holmes of H/B.

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Photo by David Beach HB Goalie Jake Kobylarz with the save.

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Photo by David Beach Patrick Spenard of Bedford tries to break up breakaway of team captian Patrick Clark.

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Photo by David Beach Bedford's Michael Ahern, left, and Hollis/Brookline's Conor Venuti battle it out.

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HOOKSETT – Jake Hahnl certainly gave Hollis/Brookline something to cheer about Saturday.

The Cavaliers were a bit outmatched against the Bedford Bulldogs in their Division III quarterfinal matchup, but the sophomore goalie was nearly standing on his head in the Cavaliers’ 4-1 loss.

“Our goaltender didn’t play midgets, didn’t play last season, because I had two goaltenders already,” Cavaliers coach Tim Clark said, “and he didn’t play preseason. He just came on board and he played unbelievable today.”

Hahnl finished with 31 saves in the No. 7 Cavaliers’ (9-9-1) season finale, but it was Bedford which went on scoring runs in the final minutes of both the first and second periods to earn a spot in the semifinals for the second straight year in as many varsity seasons.

The second-seeded Bulldogs (who reached 31 program wins Wednesday) will be moving up to Division II next winter, but before that transition they’ll face Kennett at noon Saturday at the Verizon Wireless Arena in Manchester.

“These guys are going to Division II, and they should,” Clark said. “They have 400 more kids than we do in our school. They have a JV program already and we don’t yet.”

Bedford had several skaters in on the scoring as Michael Ahern, Kevin Shaugnessy and Samuel Pelletier each finished with a goal and an assist as the Bulldogs improved to 17-2.

What kept Bedford coach Matt Guerard on the his toes were two 5-on-3 power-play advantages the Cavaliers were given despite not converting on either. Bedford goalie Benjamin Firman (six saves) wasn’t tested often, but survived a busy second period due to those penalties.

“(Trevor Sonovick) didn’t have to hit him, but I guess that’s the playoffs, you want to be the big guy and hit him,” Guerard said of the first power play which came after an unnecessary hit at the first period buzzer. Another Bulldogs penalty had already begun. “But that forced us into our first 5-on-3, and then we took a few more undisciplined penalties and fell again into another 5-on-3. We weathered the storm there, but if we do that on Wednesday we’ll be in trouble.”

Bedford got on the board with 3:16 remaining in the opening period when a Tyler Wise slap shot was tipped in by Sonovick, assisted by Ahern. The Bulldogs nearly gave up a goal on Hollis/Brookline’s best opportunity of the first a few minutes later, but Luke McDonough instead nearly went untouched to the opposite end.

However, Ahern was there to put in the rebound with 25 seconds remaining and the Cavs were slightly deflated.

“I think we came out a little flat in the first, not so much skating-wise, but shooting-wise,” Guerard said. “We were shooting right at his chest, or firing it wide. We didn’t have our sticks down in front of the net until four minutes to go and the guys realized, you know get your sticks down, hit the net and we’re gonna put the puck in.”

The second period opened with a 5-on-3 advantage in the Cavs’ favor, but they failed to convert. However, shortly afterwards Tommy Kyrias plugged in a pass from Patrick Clark with 10:58 left and the Cavs were within one.

Hollis/Brookline controlled things for much of the second period, which included another 5-on-3 situation with two Bulldogs in the box with 6:32 remaining.

But Bedford killed that as well.

Then with under three minutes to go, Pelletier grabbed a Cavs clearing pass inside the blue line and went in untouched.

Two minutes later, Pelletier found Shaughnessy with nine seconds left for another Bulldogs goal.