Photos courtesy of Greg Lindsay . To view a complete gallery, click on the following link: https://solsports.zenfolio.com/p239030494
By GORDON GLANTZ
Don’t look now, but there’s a “new” kid in town in the American Division of the Suburban High School Hockey League.
After a few years lost in the wilderness of combined teams to maintain a semblance of an existence, Hatboro Horsham is a true team.
“This is my fourth year at varsity after four years at middle school,” said coach Shane Smith. “My first year at varsity we had a very light team. We had three skaters and a goalie. The next year, we were combined with Tennent. Then, we were combined with Upper Dublin. We had an influx of freshmen this year, and we’re back to standing on our two feet again.”
That may be putting it mildly.
The Hatters are serving notice. Entering December’s action, they are 3-1.
“I have pretty high expectations for this team,” Smith continued. “I have some real good players that are upperclassmen, and the freshmen that came on board are pretty good freshmen.”
After a season-opening 11-6 loss to PW, which was marred by bad penalties and having to put a defenseman (Connor Smith) in at goalie due to injury, the Hatters rolled off wins over Springfield (3-2), Abington (6-1) and Springfield again (5-3).
In those three wins, the Hatters have outscored opponents, 14-6.
“Everybody is buying in,” said Smith, who was looking forward to seeing a much-improved 2-2 Wissahickon squad on Thursday (8:30 p.m., Hatfield Blue. “It’s starting to click. We’re starting to feel it now.”
Considering they are off to a strong start, there is no reason to think the Hatters can’t earn an invite to the Flyers Cup.
“It’s very exciting,” said Smith, whose team will get another crack at PW, this time with a healthy goalie, next Wednesday night. “I’ve been telling them since Day One what I feel about this team. This team is a championship caliber team. I truly feel that we are skilled enough to hang with anybody. We’re skilled enough to make a strong push.
“I hope we get to the Flyers Cup. I’ve never been there myself, so that would be kind of cool.”
The “new” Hatters roll three forward lines, plus an extra forward, and have two defensive pairs.
Senior captain Victor Wilkins, a club-level player, has paced the attack with 7 goals and an assist in three games.
“He’s a very talented kid,” said Smith. “He’s sort of our shooter, our sniper. He’s everything you want in a captain.”
Junior Nathan Nemchinov, along with Vincent Graziani, have each chipped in with 2 goals and 4 helpers in the early going.
“Nathan Nemchinov is just a kid with a motor,” said Smith. “He has disgusting hands. He is just filthy.”
Senior Darius Graziani has 3 goals and 2 assists, but there is more to his game than numbers.
“I love this kid,” said Smith. “We have given him the nickname of ‘Gritty.’ While he may not be the highest goal producer on the team, he’s always there on every play. He’s a guy you can count on with the forecheck and the backcheck to do everything. He is that guy who you wish you have 12 of.”
The defense has been led by the aforementioned Connor Smith and Brady Gurt, both seniors.
“They are both solid,” said Smith. “Connor is probably our vocal leader back there. He’s the one who will pump up the team.”
The coach also expects a younger defenseman, freshman Aiden North, to emerge as a force.
“He’s a phenomenal defenseman,” said Smith. “He’s a kid to watch. He has very strong puck movement and skating skills. He’s going to be someone on our blue line going forward to help to keep the fort down.”
With young players like North, and others in the pipeline, the Hatters should not be in danger of not being a true team for the near future.
Although they will lose five seniors, there are four freshmen coming up.
“We’ve got a couple of years,” said Smith. “I wish I had a better feel for the longevity of it. We’re going to have a freshman goaltender next year, and he’s a solid goaltender, so that’s at least five years of solid goaltending.
“I know we are getting three or four more freshman next year who are fairly decent. They have come out to a couple of our practices. We’re in a lot better shape than we were before. Last year, we had seven guys and no goaltender. That’s why we joined with Upper Dublin. The had seven guys, too, but they had a goaltender.”
The one and only true goalie, sophomore Eric Miller (4.21 goals against average, .835 save percentage) is previous roller hockey player who has shown steady improvement.
“He came out to our practices last year to try it and learn,” said Smith. “We coached him up a little bit, and he’s our guy this year. He’s been doing a good job.”
Smith is truly Philly boy. He grew up in the Oxford Circle section of the Northeast and attended the former Cardinal Dougherty before attending Temple University.
Although neither Dougherty nor Temple had teams when he attended, he played on the adult league circuit for two decades.
“I’ve been coaching from when my own son was in sports, so that’s like 10 to 15 years,” said Smith, who has two assistant coaches who played at HH. “I have a whole lot of hockey knowledge rolling around up in my head.”
Moreover, Smith is not planning on leaving any time soon.
“I’m planning on sticking around,” he said. “A bunch of these kids who are on the team now, I had them when I was coaching in middle school. We’ve been together for six years. I can’t just bail on them and walk away. We have too much history together.”
Running Out Front
In the National Division of the SHSHL, Council Rock South (5-0) and CB South are setting the pace early.
The difference between them was an authoritative 6-0 win by the Golden Hawks over the Titans on Nov. 18.
Circle Dec. 11 on your calendars, when they meet again at 9 p.m. at Grundy B.
Lamplighters
Four National Conference snipers have already notched double digits in goals. They are Council Rock North’s Jackson Accardi (13 goals), Pennridge’s Shane Dackowski (11), Council Rock South’s Jake Weiner (11) and Council Rock North’s Ivan Bondra (10).
In the American, PW’s Cooper Kanze needed just two games to notch 7 goals, tying him with HH’s Wilkins.
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