Blue Devils ice hockey falls to GA in rematch

by Tom Utescher
Posted 2/1/23

For their second meeting on the ice this season, the Springside Chestnut Hill Academy and Germantown Academy hockey teams took a trip up Route 309.

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Blue Devils ice hockey falls to GA in rematch

Posted

For their second meeting on the ice this season, the Springside Chestnut Hill Academy and Germantown Academy hockey teams took a trip up Route 309 last Tuesday to GA's home rink, the Hatfield Ice Arena.

This is also where the GA Patriots practice, and they took a 4-0 lead in the first period on the way to a 7-3 victory that included a hat trick by sophomore Dominic Perazza. Germantown raised its season record to 8-3-1.

SCH, which lost at home to GA, 6-1, back in mid-December, got on the board with a marker by senior Hunter Rexford and later received two goals from eighth-grader Sam Bevan. The Blue Devils departed still looking for their first win, with an 0-7-1 record. SCH's tie came against Episcopal Academy, and GA's against Haverford School.

Last Tuesday, SCH initially went up the ice into the GA zone, but the Patriots quickly reverse the flow of play. They got on the board a little over one-and-a-half minutes into the action on an unassisted goal in transition by sophomore Daniel Alexander.

The 1-0 tally stood for around nine minutes, then the Patriots put in a pair of goal in a 17-second span. Senior Walker Schwartz netted the first of these with an assist from junior Colin Rink, then Perazza got started on his hat trick, making it 3-0 with 4:06 remaining in the opening period. Senior David Werther earned the assist on this one.

From a face-off in GA's defending zone, Patriots senior Drew Schwartz controlled the puck and made a dash up the right wing to score what proved to be the game-winning goal. The count was now 4-0 with 2:31 to go in the first period, and it stayed that way until the buzzer.

With two minutes and 40 seconds elapsed in the second round, SCH senior Hunter Rexford ended the GA shutout, scoring off a feed from sophomore Brendan Russell. There would be only one more marker in this, the lowest-scoring period of the game. With 3:29 remaining, Perazza recorded his second goal, slipping a shot under the SCH crossbar.

Just before the buzzer sounded to end the second period, a shot by Germantown's Walker Schwartz clanged off the right post of the SCH cage, and the score remained 5-1.

In goal for the Blue Devils was one of the five eighth-graders on the Springside Chestnut Hill roster, Alex Luce. He's splitting time in goal this season with another young keeper, freshman Michael Nicolucci.

Last winter, Lucy Fassler was Germantown Academy's reserve goalie. This year, as a junior, she's stepped into the starting role, and has performed very well.

The scoring pace picked up right away in the third period, which was only 34 seconds old when Perazza completed his hat trick with a shot into the top right corner. Werther and Walker Schwartz were credited with assists.

This time Springside Chestnut Hill responded less than a minute later. Rexford, who'd scored the Blue Devils' first goal, now assisted on the second by delivering the puck to the young Bevan on a breakaway. Bevan drew Fassler out of the cage and then got a shot past her.

Much later in the period, with less than three minutes left to play, the same scoring combo for SCH closed up the score to 6-3. Bevan finished with a flick that sent the puck tumbling off the body of Fassler and into the goal.

In these late minutes, GA players had been looking to set up a goal by Werther, a senior who'd started out as a novice player in his freshman year. He'd earned a number of assists with the Patriots, but had never scored a goal of his own. For this reason, there was quite a reaction among the Pats when Werther found the back of the cage with 54 seconds remaining, assisted by Walker Schwartz and Perazza.

On a final rush for the Blue Devils, Bevan got off a shot as the buzzer sounded, but the puck crossed the goal line after time had expired.