CENTRAL NEW YORK – Early in the week before Christmas, each of the area’s ice hockey teams delivered the type of performances that could resonate long beyond this early-season marker.
On the brink of a damaging home defeat at Shove Park Tuesday night, West Genesee stormed back from a two-goal deficit against Fayetteville-Manlius, forced overtime and pulled out a 3-2 victory.
Both sides went scoreless until the second period, when the Hornets went out in front, and then doubled the margin to 2-0 early in the third period, the goals coming from Will Sanzone and Jack Lalik, F-M led 2-0 deep into the third period, poised to earn a landmark victory.
With less than five minutes left, WG still trailed by two, yet made it all the way back with all-out pressure and an extra attacker, seeing Nick Meluni and Ryan Long each find the net to force overtime, where on a breakaway Jonah Vormwald converted to win it.
Luke Beck’s 28 saves kept the Wildcats in it as F-M counterpart Chris Finger had 30 saves. Jesse Desena got two assists, with single assists going to Jacob Pensabene and Christian Ball.
In the case of Skaneateles, it took charge of its first-place Division II clash with New Hartford Monday at Allyn Arena in the game’s middle stages at Allyn Arena, not letting up until it had defeated the Spartans 5-1.
As this went on, the Skaneateles girls faced the same Ithaca side it dramatically beat in overtime 11 days earlier and, this time, led from the outset and doubled up the Little Red in a 6-3 victory.
All through the early part of the season, the Lakers’ problem was that it saved its best work for late in games, but it had no choice but to produce here thanks to Ithaca’s pair of first-period goals.
Emphatic in its response, Skaneateles found the net four times, its most productive period of the season, and was up 4-2, holding a lead it would not relinquish the rest of the way.
Makayla Barrn led the attack, netting a pair of goals and adding an assist. Deep and well-balanced, the Lakers also had Lily Kennedy, Cora Major, Kendra Garlock and Finley Hogan score, too, with Sarah Domin, in goal, stopping 18 of the 21 shots she faced.
Meanwhile, at home the Skaneateles boys put its 6-0 record and no. 2 state Division II ranking on the line against 6-0 New Hartford in the first of two regular-season showdowns.
Inching in front 1-0, the Lakers then scored three times in the second period to get away and negate Gavin Lapolla’s lone goal that broke a long Skaneateles shutout streak.
Taking 38 shots to the Spartans’ 18, Skaneateles was led by Andrew Gaglione, with two goals and one assist, and Jack Torrey, who piled up three assists. Luke Mizro, Braedan Taggert and Trevor Jensen also scored, with Mizro joining Kasey Rutledge and Cole Palmer in the single-assist column.
Syracuse made it back-to-back wins last Tuesday by defeating Ontario Bay 6-2, the Cougars bolting out to a 3-0 lead by the end of the first period and never getting caught.
Ryan Victoriano led the way with a three-goal hat trick, while Nick Rayfield scored twice and got two assists. Will Scanlon had the other goal as Will Glass earned three assists. Single assists went to Owen Etoll, Liam McCullough, Jason Borte and Pat Sheridan.
