Photos provided courtesy of Tracy Valko. Check back for a gallery of game photos. All SOS photo galleries for ICE HOCKEY can be viewed by clicking HERE.
By Ben Reese
HATFIELD — Nick Bruno picked the right time to end his goal drought.
The Central Bucks West forward scored four goals including the game-winner in a third period explosion to lift the Bucks to an 8-5 victory over North Penn at Hatfield Ice on Wednesday night. It is the first conference win for the Bucks while the Knights are still searching for their initial Continental Conference triumph.
Bruno got West off to a quick start in the first period with the first two goals of the game. They led the Bucks to a 3-1 lead after one stanza.
But the Knights came roaring back in the second period, scoring three times to one for West to tie the score at 4-4. Then in the third period, it was the Bucks’ turn to put pucks in the net. They outscored North Penn 4-1 to take the decision.
When asked why he waited so long to score his third (and fourth) goal, Bruno was tactful.
“I think it just came at the right time,” he said. “That pass from Billy Loughnane in the third was huge to get that third goal. I haven’t been scoring recently. Tonight, it came off okay.”
Bruno’s four goals against North Penn gave him seven for the season. However, they were the first goals he had scored since tallying one against Souderton on Dec. 2, six games ago.
“He’s been snake-bit a little during the season,” said CB West coach Dave Baun. “Tonight they went in for him.”
What turned him around, coach?
“He took to heart a lot of the things we worked on this week,” Baun said. “Going to the net with their sticks down, shooting pucks on the net. If they are going at angles, to put them off pads, set up rebound chances, be aggressive around the net.
“You could see that he took that to heart. He put a lot of shots on net and buried some.”
What happened in the second period?
“After the first period, we sensed that the kids were celebrating a little bit,” Baun said. “As a coach, you kind of feel what is coming next and (darn) if it didn’t happen.”
Bruno could sense something also.
“I feel that we stepped off the gas a little bit in the second period,” he said. “(We) thought we were winning by too much and kind of slowed down.”
Things changed in the third period though.
“We told them at the beginning of the third period that we were going to judge what kind of team we are by what we do in the third period, not what we did in the first period,” said Baun. “So we said - let’s try to score three goals here, and we’ll see what we’re made of. I was really happy with the result.”
On the other side of the ice, North Penn had a different perspective.
“We didn’t start out the best,” assistant coach Matt Stella, filling in for head coach Kevin Vaitis, said. “I think everybody on the team can agree with that. That second period, we played our hearts out. The leadership group on this team, the seniors, kind of took it, said a couple of words and got on the guys and lit a fire under their butts.
“I think they all wanted to win. We gave up the goal at the end of the second period which kind of brought us back down to earth a little bit. Coming back out in the third and scoring that goal, I thought we had the momentum going for us. It looked promising for a bit, but sometimes it just doesn’t bounce our way.”
West came barreling out on fire in the first period. Bruno notched his first goal only 12 seconds into the game, added a second at 3:27 before Adam Ricci gave the Bucks a 3-0 lead. Ben Mostochuck got one back for North Penn on the power play before the period ended.
The Knights turned the tables in the second. Goals by Tyler Porubski, John Stinson and Joe Silvotti gave them a 4-3 lead before Joey McFadden tied it with 40 seconds remaining in the period.
North Penn again took the lead with 53 seconds elapsed in the third on Nolan O’Toole’s unassisted goal. But somehow you got the feeling that it wouldn’t be enough.
It wasn’t.
West reeled off four straight goals to settle the issue. Ricci tied the score and then Bruno (his third), Loughnane and Bruno again (his fourth) finished it off.
“I love playing North Penn because they always give you a good game,” Baun said. “I think that they always play hard and clean against us.
“A couple of pucks go one way or the other and maybe the game ends up the other way.”
CB West 8, North Penn 5
CB West 3 1 4 — 8
North Penn 1 3 1 — 5
First period: 1, Nick Bruno CBW (Billy Loughnane) 0:12; 2, Bruno CBW (Loughnane) 3:27; 3, Adam Ricci CBW (Joey McFadden) 5:12; 4, Ben Mostochuck NP (Joe Silvotti) 15:32 PP.
Second period: 5, Tyler Porubski NP (Derek Delong) 7:04; 6, John Stinson NP (Silvotti) 13:45; 7, Silvotti NP (Stinson) 14:58; 8, McFadden CBW (Ricci, Luke Tremmel) 16:20.
Third period: 9, Nolan O’Toole NP (unassisted) 0:53; 10, Ricci CBW (Reese Dalzell, Tremmel) 8:40; 11, Bruno CBW (Loughnane, Anthony Dowd) 13:40; 12, Loughnane CBW (Bruno, Dowd) 14:29; 13, Bruno (unassisted) 15:12.
Shots: CBW 37, NP 35. Saves: Liam Rogers (CBW) 30; Nick Ebbinghaus (NP) 29.
- Log in to post comments
