In different ways, and with different results, the CBA/Jamesville-DeWitt ice hockey team continued to prove itself to anyone who may have doubted them.
Following its 3-3 tie at Skaneateles on Dec. 17, the Brothers went out of league play and visited Meachem Rink Monday night, rallying from behind to defeat the Syracuse Cougars in a 3-2 thriller.
At the outset, it was CBA/J-D’s defense in the spotlight, for it was facing a Syracuse squad that was 4-1 and, in its previous two games (wins over Fayetteville-Manlius and Fulton), had scored a combined 25 goals.
But the Cougars would get shut out for most of the first period here, slowed down by the Brothers’ effective back line and goaltender Gabe Vinal making a series of early stops.
All was quiet until the Brothers’ Tanner Coleman, amid a scramble in front of the net at the 9:48 mark, poked the puck past Sam Walsh to put his side in front 1-0.
After seeing a second CBA/J-D disallowed due to goaltender interference, the Cougars tied it, 1-1, with 1:14 left in the opening period thanks to Sean Eccles’ power-play goal.
It stayed that way until late in the second period. Both teams squandered power-play chances, but at the 10:49 mark Syracuse, again with the man advantage, grabbed a 2-1 lead as Sean Eccles converted again, with Matt Eccles and C.J. Walsh getting assists.
For the rest of the game, though, the Cougars could not put anything past Vinal, who turned back 26 of the 28 shots he faced, giving his side plenty of time to rally.
Sure enough, with 9:55 left it was tied again, 2-2, thanks to a goal by the Brothers’ Kane Alletzhauser, who was only playing as a forward due to injuries elsewhere on the roster.
Then, with less than five minutes left, CBA/J-D captain Ryan Durkin, taking a well-timed pass from Lucas Relkin, flipped the puck past Walsh for the go-ahead goal. Though the Cougars tried to answer down the stretch, it could not do so.
On that same night, F-M met Auburn in non-league play and lost, 11-1, to the Maroons, giving up 10 of those goals in the first two periods.
Only Trevor Pokines found the net for the Hornets, with Will Healy getting the assist. Between them, goalies Erik Badger and Kwame Morris made 31 saves, with Kaiden Tubbert leading Auburn by recording a three-goal hat trick, plus two assists.
F-M would play Cicero-North Syracuse Friday at the Onondaga County War Memorial in the fourth annual “Pink the Rink” fund-raiser, which precedes the Syracuse Crunch’s game against Albany. All proceeds from the game would benefit the Carol Baldwin Breast Cancer Research Fund, and more than $25,000 has been raised in the first three years of the event.
