Win over Eagles led to Baron's Cup finals

A semi-final win over the Eagles on Fri­day in North Olm­sted gave Amherst the go-ahead to take down Solon on Sun­day for the Baron’s Cup. For cov­er­age of the final game, read our Feb. 15, 2012 print edition.

The road to Baron’s Cup vic­tory started with a first-round bye earned by fin­ish­ing first in the White Divi­sion, fol­lowed Fri­day by semi-final play against North Olm­sted at Brooklyn.

Four min­utes into the first period, Caleb Gan­nelli and Con­nor Mor­ris helped each other to the blue line and Gan­nelli rebounded on his own missed shot to score.

A minute later, short-handed by a penalty, Mor­ris snagged the puck and nearly scored a short-handed goal. Amherst played great penalty-kill hockey to keep North Olm­sted off the scoreboard.

With 6:31 show­ing on the clock, it seemed the wheels might have fallen off for the Comets.

Mor­ris col­lided with an oppos­ing player and was sent reel­ing across the ice. An injury to his right leg took Amherst’s most pro­lific scorer out of the game.

Within 55 sec­onds, the Eagles had scored twice to take a 2–1 lead.

Mor­ris made his way slowly out of the locker room and back onto the ice with 10 min­utes left. His pres­ence may have re-energized his team­mates, as Jared Andolsek and Michael Kuhn teamed up with Dakota Dill to tie the score.

Dill worked the puck out from behind the North Olm­sted net and ripped a mon­strous back­hand shot for the score.

As the third period started, Dill took the puck up the left side of the ice. As he tried to turn the cor­ner, two of the Eagles pushed him past the goal line where he didn’t have a shot.

Instead, he launched a pass straight out in front of the goalie, where Kevin Bur­gett blasted the puck into the net.

The rink announcer had not fin­ished announc­ing the goal when Bur­gett scored again on an assist from Mor­ris and John Reid.

With a two-goal lead, the Comets went into a defen­sive for­ma­tion with about four min­utes remaining.

The final nail in the North Olm­sted cof­fin was a penalty with 2:17 on the clock.

Amherst worked to con­trol the puck for the entire power play, lim­it­ing any chance for the Eagles.

The Comets out-shot North Olm­sted 30–10 and the defense lim­ited the Eagles to only four shots in the final two periods.

Spe­cial to the News-Times, by Tim Brascum.

Posted by Jason Hawk on Feb 15 2012. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.