The West Haven Squirt A travel hockey team dropped a pair of games this weekend. The Blue Devils fell 7-3 to Stamford A at Bennett Rink on Saturday and 8-3 to Yale A at the Northford Ice Pavilion on Sunday.
In the opening contest, West Haven forward Cameren Lipford deked his way to the net to cut the Sharks lead to 2-1 in the first period. Forward Ryan Walsh assisted on the play.
Lipford contributed two more goals, both assisted by forward Aedan Guarino, in the third period.
Against Yale, Aedan Guarino scored first for West Haven, tying the game 1-1 midway through the first period with Lipford assisting on the play. Trailing 3-1, the Blue Devils trimmed the contest to 3-2 on a goal by Lipford with four seconds left in the first.
Lipford tallied his second goal of the game late in the second period.
Goalie Alex Werle kept the Westies within striking distance in both games, making several outstanding saves.
The West Haven Peewee A hockey team swept its weekend games and posted its first two wins of the season in the process. The Blue Devils won 4-3 over the Riverhawks A, and topped New Canaan A1, 6-3. Peewee A is now 2-4-0 on the season.
On Saturday evening, the Westies headed to The Rinks at Shelton for a road game against the Riverhawks. Trailing 1-0, Brady Price tied things up for the Westies.
West Haven took the lead with a power play goal early in the second period when Ronnie Mastroni picked up a rebound of an Ethan Kelly shot for a 2-1 lead.
Three minutes later, Connor Moriarty pushed the lead to 3-1. With just over four minutes left in the period the Kelly brothers connected for a goal when Matt Kelly hit Ethan Kelly and Ethan sniped home a wrist shot for the 4-1 lead.
In the third period, the Riverhawks scored twice and closed to within a goal. West Haven goaltender Greg Galasso made three big saves down the stretch to preserve the win. Galasso (8 saves) and Jacob Silva (7) split the game in net.
On Sunday morning at Edward L. Bennett Rink, the Westies faced New Canaan A1. Down, 1-0, 6:54 into the game, the Blue Devils tied the contest when Alex Bowery buried his wrist shot. Just 2:38 later, the Westies took the lead with a power play goal as Ryan Pniewski hit Mastroni, who fired a missile off the right post and in for a 2-1 advantage. Twenty-nine seconds later it was 3-1 Westies when Ethan Kelly flicked the puck to Mike Page for a nice one-timer. Galasso made six saves in the period for West Haven.
The Blue Devils made it 4-1 at 6:40 of the second period on another Bowery goal.
Silva relieved Galasso and made two big saves on a New Canaan power play. West Haven then made the score 5-1 with 13.8 seconds left in the period when Sean Studley’s shot rang off the post, but Ethan Kelly knocked in the rebound.
Mastroni scored the final goal of the game off an assist from Jonathan Charbonneau. Galasso had six saves and Silva stopped seven shots. The Westies outshot New Canaan 22-16 for the game.
The West Haven Peewee AA travel hockey team had its first CHC game of the season in Darien against New Canaan on Saturday. Playing without two key players, Brody DiNuzzo and Nick Salzano, the Westies played hard, but fell, 6-4.
West Haven started strong, taking the early lead in the first with Jack Aloi’s goal from the point, assisted by Thomas Porto. Later in the first, a goal from Billy Mascari gave the Westies a 2-0 lead.
New Canaan quickly rebounded with three unanswered goals in the second period. Despite two more goals in the third from Drew Kaufaman, assisted by Zach Goetze and Cooper Deko, New Canaan added a pair of empty net goals, and the Westies fell 6-4.
On Sunday, the Westies traveled to Monsey, NY to face the Ramapo Saints AA for EJ action.
The Westies quickly rebounded from Saturday’s loss and dominated the game, winning 9-1. West Haven received goals from Gabe Locklear (2), John Donahue (2), Goetze, Nicky Stevens, Connor Benz, Nick Eberhart and Mascari. Aloi led the defense with three assists.
The West Haven Bantam A travel hockey team fell to 1-4-1 with a pair of losses this weekend. The Westies opened the weekend with a 6-2 loss against Wonderland AA on Saturday, before dropping a 4-3 decision against the Riverhawks A on Sunday.
At the Edward L. Bennett Rink on Saturday morning, Wonderland scored twice in each of the first two periods for a 4-0 lead. An unassisted goal by Jayden Spreyer got West Haven within 4-1 early in the third, but Wonderland came back with two more goals for a 6-1 advantage.
The Westies battled and received a power play goal from Cade Simone with 1:36 remaining in the game. Christopher Adkins and Matt Wezenski each assisted on the tally.
The Westies suffered a gut-wrenching defeat on Sunday, falling to the Riverhawks at the Rinks in Shelton. Despite superb goaltending from Brendan Smith, West Haven could not hold on to a third period lead as penalties were too much to overcome and the Riverhawks scored three times.
West Haven took a 1-0 lead with 4:50 to go in the opening period as Spreyer picked up a rebound of a Dave Brown shot off the post for a power play goal. Brown gave the Westies a 2-0 lead when he took a pass from Michael Madera and scored with 48 seconds left in the opening period.
The Riverhawks scored once in the second, then scored three times, including twice on the power play, in a span of 2:01 in the third to take a 4-2 lead. Colin Deane scored off an assist from Wezenski with 1:39 left, but West Haven could not get the equalizer.
The West Haven Bantam B travel hockey team opened the weekend with an away double header on Saturday.
First, the Westies faced off against East Haven and suffered their third loss of the season. Despite a goal from Max Ginsberg, off assists from Ashley Welch and Zack Fonda, and another from Matt Wright, the Westies could not overcome 11 penalties and fell, 4-2.
The second game was against Yale at Ingalls Rink and saw the Westies jump on the scoreboard first when Danny Johnson deflected a shot from Kevin Gardner. Youssef Ullah also added an assist on the goal.
Yale tied the game at the end of the period and then built a 3-1 lead, but the Westies caught life halfway through the third period with a goal by Fonda off an assist from TJ Levenduski.
Ginsberg added a goal to tie the game at three off assists from Fonda and Welch. With under 20 seconds left in the game, the Westies called timeout with the face off in their zone. The Westies won the draw and moved the puck down the ice and Ginsberg slid a rebound past the goalie with 0.1 seconds on the clock to get the win.
On Sunday, the Westies faced off against Stamford at Bennett Rink. West Haven continued its momentum from the previous day with Welch assisting Fonda for the first goal within 14 seconds of puck drop.
The goals continued in West Haven’s 12-1 win with three goals each from Gardner and Youssef Ullah, two goals each from Tyler Bernardi and Wright, and a goal from Nate Chiappetta.
Along with Welch, Johnson (2), Fonda (2), Loehfelm (2), Kerzner, Chiappetta and Javed Ullah added assists.
The Westies now stand at 3-3-1 on the season.