West Springfield, MA – Pope Francis came out flying in the first, scoring 3 goals on the first couple shifts. St. John’s Shrewsbury called a timeout early and changed goalies to Junior Owen Polombo to reset but Pope kept coming in waves finishing the first period up 4-0 with clear domination from start to finish of the period. Pope’s depth was clearly demonstrated with goals coming from Josh Iby (2), Derek Rhodes, and Mossy Kearney.
The second period was a mix of both teams taking control of the period with Pope coming out and keeping the momentum going for the start of the period. However, penalties really hurt Pope as they took 2 back to back and St. John’s was able to capitalize on both miscues. St. John’s made the game 4-2 halfway through the period, with goals coming from Sean Farrell and Andrew Brown. With the score tighter, the physical play picked up from both sides with some big hits resulting in St. John’s starting to get more shots on net and this increased the pressure on Pope. However, this wasn’t enough as Joe DiMichele of Pope came down and scored on the power play to make it 5-2 at the end of the second period.
St.John’s responded starting the third with sustained offensive zone time and eventually led to a goal by Luke Gerardi to make it a 5-3 game. St. John’s continued to bring all the pressure to Pope and halfway through the period, Jonathan Wang ripped one by the Pope Francis goalkeeper to make things interesting as the game was now 5-4. The game opened up and shifted to more back and forth end to end style with Pope able to hold on and answer a couple minutes later with a huge goal from Ryan O’Leary in the slot to close the game out. St. John’s continued to push and pulled their goalie, but Pope scored an empty net late to finish the game 7-4.
Three Stars:
- F Josh Iby, Pope Francis
- F Derek Rhodes, Pope Francis
- F Sean Farrell, St. John’s Shrewsbury