The trend of BHBS hockey’s dominance over CBA continued on Wednesday night, as the Spartans defeated the Brothers 5-3 to move on to the Section 2 semi-finals. It was the third win for BHBS over CBA in just this season, and 6th consecutive win for the Spartans in the series. They hold an 8-1-2 record all time vs the Brothers.
Geordan Buffoline and Tino Benamati each scored twice, and Dom Monterroso scored his 7th goal of the season to propel the Spartans to a 10th consecutive win overall. Senior goalie Mark Stocker stopped 36 shots for his 6th consecutive win in net. He has not lost in his last 8 starts (7-0-1). Ryan Munro, Owen Greene, and Peter Galica scored for the Brothers, and goalie Justin Bryar made 23 saves in the loss. Bryar had a rough finish to the year, going 1-4-0 in his last 6 starts, including 3 straight losses. He finishes the season with a .876 save percentage (10th in Section 2 among qualifying goaltenders), and a 2.95 goals against average.
Just like Saturday’s meeting between the two teams, CBA was able to strike first, when Ryan Munro tapped home a good feed from Jake Bundy. But BHBS was able to quickly answer, and they would not trail the rest of the game. Geordan Buffoline scored his 23rd goal of the year just 18 seconds later to tie it at 1-1, and Tino Benamati gave the Spartans the lead for good with a goal 4 minutes after that. Senior forward Dom Monterroso, playing in his final game on home ice, ripped a wrister past Bryar for his 7th goal of the season, to make it 3-1 BHBS with 5 minutes remaining in the first. A beautiful passing sequence from Sam Swingruber to Benamati ended in Benamati’s second goal of the period, and it was 4-1 BHBS after just 1 period.
The second period had much less scoring, but no lack of excitement. Both teams had several quality scoring chances, but nobody was able to find the back of the net until Geordan Buffoline scored on a wrap-around with 13 seconds remaining in the period. BHBS led 5-1 after 2.
The third period was when things got interesting. Owen Greene’s shot from the point found a home just a minute and a half into the period to cut the lead to 5-2. Then, just a minute later, Peter Galica blew past the defense and forced home another one, and it was quickly just a 5-3 game with 12:26 remaining. BHBS would buckle down on defense after those lapses, and hang on to win it 5-3.
For the Spartans, they improve to 16-4-1 on the season, and will play at Saratoga on Friday in the Section 2 semi-final matchup, with the winner advancing to Union to play either Tri-Falls or La Salle. For CBA, their season is over, and they finish 10-11-0, a big step forward from last year’s 4-17-0 team. Even with the improvement, the Brothers didn’t really show that they could beat a quality opponent, finishing 0-7-0 against the top 4 teams in Section 2, including 3 losses to BHBS. Still, it is definitely something to build off of for CBA head coach Blaine Drescher.
GOALS:
1st Period:
14:10 (CBA)- Ryan Munro (2) ASST: Jake Bundy (2)
13:52 (BHBS)- Geordan Buffoline (23) ASST: Alec Lind (20), Tino Benamati (23)
9:25 (BHBS)- Tino Benamati (22) ASST: Geordan Buffoline (32)
5:09 (BHBS)- Dom Monterroso (7) ASST: Brody McCarthy (4)
0:12 (BHBS)- Tino Benamati (23) ASST: Sam Swingruber (15)
2nd Period:
0:13 (BHBS)- Geordan Buffoline (24) ASST: Alec Lind (21)
3rd Period:
13:32 (CBA)- Owen Greene (8) ASST: NONE
12:26 (CBA)- Peter Galica (6) ASST: Ryan Munro (3)
