By Ben Reese
HATFIELD — When Suburban High School Hockey League American Division leader Plymouth Whitemarsh arrived at Hatfield Ice for the Colonials’ game against Hatboro-Horsham, it was missing some things.
Now don’t get the wrong impression. The Colonials all had their skates, their sweaters, their sticks and all the accompanying accouterments. It was their three leading scorers that weren’t there.
Those three — Blake Ambler, Chris London and Cooper Kanze — were all attending a mandatory club hockey practice. That is not an unusual situation in high school ice hockey.
But it did leave PW in a bit of a bind. However, looking at the 8-5 win by the Colonials, you would never know it.
A lot of players stepped up to take over the scoring load. And the defense got stingy exactly when it had to.
“Charlie Spause, Ryan Jagher, especially our goalie Julian Lucks all had a great game,” said PW captain Dan Guller.
“Obviously, Cooper, Blake and London are big parts of our team. Without them, I don’t know what we would do but tonight I told everybody we’ve got to lock in.
“We prepared. We got pucks deep. We forechecked.”
Assistant coach Dan Smith, filling in for PW head coach Vince Forti, added a couple of other names.
“Dan Molony, Morgan Hullitt,” he said, “those guys on the line really stepped up for us.”
When it came to stepping up, up, however, one name stood out to both Guller and Smith.
That name was Brandon Wooldridge. He is a forward on the team and not one of the big goal scorers.
But he came up big against the Hatters. He scored a goal in the second period to help bring the Colonials back from a two-goal deficit and then added another early in the third period which gave PW the lead for good.
“Brandon Wooldridge had an incredible game,” Smith said.
Guller echoed the sentiment. “Brandon Wooldridge had an awesome game,” he said. “I think he had a couple of goals and some assists.”
He did. He contributed assists on PW’s third and eighth goals.
But did you have to change your strategy with your top scorers out, coach?
“We didn’t really have to change any strategy,” Smith said. “Everyone gave 100 percent effort.
“We really wanted to focus on putting pressure on in our defensive zone. We’ve gotten off to some slow starts the entire season, but these guys just showed that they have no quit.”
Hatter coach Shane Smith (a lot of Smiths in this one) admitted that he wasn’t aware PW was missing those three.
“I did not know that,” he said. “That’s surprising.
“That means they are a really strong team. They exploited us without their top three. We’ve got to head back and do some more work.”
Hatboro-Horsham spent a lot of time in the penalty box, something that is all too familiar for the team.
“We ended up in penalty trouble again,” Shane Smith said. “It’s something we’ve been focusing on all along.
“We got in trouble; it bit us. The kids were all in and then the penalties shot us in the foot.”
The Hatters broke out of the gate quickly. They scored the first two goals in the game in the space of slightly over five minutes.
Bill Moffa put HH on the board with only 2:51 gone in the opening period. Nathan Nemchinov followed at 5:18 and things looked good for them.
But then PW came roaring back, scoring the next three goals. Spause got the first one followed by Guller and Molony to give the Colonials a 3-2 lead after one period.
Hatboro started the second period in much the same manner as the first, netting two goals in little over five minutes. Brady Gurt opened the scoring and Bill Wilkins added the second on the power play.
Then the Hatters added another marker to take a two-goal lead. Darius Graziani beat PW goalie Lucks at the 6:45 mark on the power play.
That lead didn’t last long. Six minutes later, Wooldridge got his first goal and two minutes after that Hullitt tied the score at 5-5 going into the third period.
This is when Wooldridge put the game in the win column for PW. With 4:42 gone in the third stanza, he beat HH goalie Eric Miller with assists going to Guller and Molony and the Colonials never trailed again.
Luke Smith (another one) and Molony finished up the scoring for the Colonials. The win keeps PW unbeaten in the division.
Plymouth Whitemarsh 8, Hatboro-Horsham 5
Plymouth Whitemarsh 3 2 3 — 8
Hatboro-Horsham 2 3 0 — 5
First period: 1, Bill Moffa HH (Giovanni Bucci, Evan Snow) 2:51; 2, Nathan Nemchinov HH (Darius Grazini) 5:18; 3, Charlie Spause PW (Luke Smith) 6:25; 4, Dan Guller PW (Smith, Ryan Jagher) 7:58 PP; 5, Dan Molony PW (Brandon Wooldridge, Guller) 10:45 PP.
Second period: 6, Brady Gurt HH (Connor Smith, Joe Magnin) 4:49; 7, Bill Wilkins HH (Aiden North) 5:27 PP; 8, D. Graziani HH (Vincent Graziani) 6:45 PP; 9, Wooldridge PW (Morgan Hullitt, Molony) 12:46; 10, Hullitt PW (Wooldridge) 14:55.
Third period: 11, Wooldridge PW (Guller, Molony) 4:42; 12, L. Smith PW (John Zawislak, Spause) 7:27; 13, Molony PW (Guller) 15:04.
Shots: PW 29, HH 45. Saves: Julian Lucks (PW) 37, Eric Miller (HH) 21.
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