League News

Bethel Park Blackhawks 4, Kittanning Wildcats 0

Junior Jacob Salak’s natural hat-trick led Bethel Park to the first win of the St. Margarets- Varsity Tournament.

Bethel Park’s first goal proved to be the game winner as Senior Daniel Yost put the puck past Kittanning goaltender, Cameron Langham, on a power-play. The Blackhawk goal was quickly followed up by a short-handed tally from the stick of Salak. Salak finished up the scoring with two even strength goals to secure the Blackhawk victory.

The Wildcats did not leave without a fight, but in the end, Blackhawk goaltending won the battle as Senior Austin McGinty stopped all 21 shots faced, recording the tournament’s first shutout.

Langham stopped 30 of the 34 shots faced in the Wildcats’ loss.

West A Offense Shines in Victory of Mt. Lebo

Mt. Lebanon scored first. After that, West Allegheny took control.

Steven Sramac’s goal 1:07 into the game gave the Blue Devils the 1-0 lead. That lead stood until the Indians rallied with four goals in five minutes to end the first period 4-1, West Allegheny.

The scoring went back and forth through the final two periods but ultimately saw West Allegheny taking the win.

Mt. Lebanon’s Junior Goaltender, Alex Feyche saw most of the action as he stopped 38 of the 47 shots he faced.

Senior Dylan McKenna posted the first hat-trick for the Indians, however, Freshman Jess Ligas took the scoring lead for West Allegheny. Ligas recorded two of his goals 30 seconds apart, leading to a hat-trick and five points overall (3-2-5).

Grant Gerstner turned aside 19 of 23 shots to earn the win for West Allegheny.

QV over BC

Quaker Valley ultimately walked away with a win; however Bishop Canevin made the final minutes quite the nail-biter.

After 34 minutes of play, Quaker Valley had a comfortable 5-1 lead, with three of those goals coming from their power-play unit.

Early in the third, Bishop Canevin scored on a power-play, to cut the lead, but Quaker Valley quickly replied with a power-play goal of their own to regain the four-goal lead. With less than 9 minutes left in the game, and the score at 6-2, the Crusaders were not yet ready to throw in the towel.

The Crusaders scored two goals, two minutes apart to reduce the Quaker Valley lead to two, and spark some life into the team.

With 90 seconds left in the 3^rdand ten seconds left on a Quaker Valley penalty, Quaker Valley took another penalty, putting them down two men. Bishop Canevin pulled goaltender Ryan Tucker to make a 6-on-3 situation in the Quaker Valley defensive zone.

Senior Christopher Reda capitalized on the power-play and scored his second goal of the night with 43 seconds left to place Bishop Canevin down by one.

Despite the sudden comeback, Quaker Valley Goaltender, Jonathan Pijar, remained strong in the final moments of the game to hold onto the 6-5 lead. He turned away 15 of 20 shots on the night.

Upper St. Clair 10, Serra Catholic 5

Upper St. Clair Sophomore Austin Cassidy (4-1-5) lit the lamp four times in the Panther’s thrilling 10-5 victory over Serra Catholic.

Without wasting any time, Cassidy scored forty seconds into the game to start the Panthers on a scoring spree. That spree saw 12 different Upper St. Clair players gain at least one point.

The Panthers went one for four on power-play opportunities, while also scoring on a short-handed situation. Serra Catholic capitalized on one of their five power-play opportunities.

Serra Catholic Freshman Roman Kraemer scored twice and Senior Tyler Speis notched one goal and two assists. Sophomore Goaltender Ian Ritchie took the loss, stopping 21 shots on the night.

With help from Sophomore Jack Gavett, Sophomore Matt Boyd found the back of the net for the game-winner at 7:40 into the second. Also helping the Panthers to their victory were Senior Connor Ackerman and Junior Mike McCombs, recording two goals each.  

Mike Ambrose shunned 11 shots to take home the win for Upper St. Clair.

Penguins Cup Rematch - Mars Over Hampton

Ian Houk-Graves’ goal 13 seconds into overtime lifted Mars to the thrilling victory.

Mars opened the game’s scoring with a goal late in the first period. Mars and Hampton exchanged goals throughout the game, and though Hampton never gained a lead in the duration of the game, their persistence did not let Mars’ lead last too long.

Zachary Kosick of Hampton registered three points as he played a part on all of the goals for the Talbots. Junior Goaltender, Cam Raidna recorded 26 saves in the Hampton loss.

Mars goalie, Alex Stepke recorded the win, making 20 saves on 23 shots.

North Allegheny Defeats Pine Richland in Overtime

The first night of the tournament closed with an exciting match between the North Allegheny Tigers and the Pine-Richland Rams. After 51 minutes of play, no victor was declared and the teams had to battle it out in a sudden-death, overtime round.

North Allegheny scored after ten minutes of play in the first to put the Tigers up 1-0, however, Pine-Richland quickly answered with a tally of their own by Senior Dillon Kessy.

Kessy went on to score two more for the Rams, to take a 3-1 lead and record a natural hat-trick. Kessy ended with four points on the night, and played a part in all four of Pine-Richland’s goals.

North Allegheny returned with two tallies in the second to tie the score at three after two periods.

North Allegheny’s goaltender Tyler Kuhn was replaced by teammate Bradford Thornburgh for the final period, including OT. Kuhn rejected 13 shots during his 34 minutes in net.

Both teams scored once in the third period to force overtime in a 4-4 game.

With two minutes played in overtime, Tigers’ Senior Cody Black tallied his third of the game with an assist from Shawn Baird and Connor Cash to win the game. Cash also recorded two of the Tigers’ goals.

Thornburgh recorded the win for the Tigers, saving 6 of 7 shots faced. Goaltender Brendan Bagnato put aside 40 of 45 shots in the Rams loss.