Sports

Pressure's On for Flyers Hockey in 2011-12 Season

St. Joseph by the Sea rallies against Chaminade in third period for 2-2 tie.

Pressure is what will be surrounding the 25 players on the varsity hockey team for the 2011 season.

“A lot” is what first-year assistant coach Kevin Bendl said the staff is expecting from the players this year, which include a top line made up of a pair of juniors, a sophomore and a junior goalie in Brandon Destasio in front of the net.

Last season systems of play , a change which will be stressed this year.

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“We’re going to implement them as we go on in the season more and more,” Bendl said of the Flyer’s plans. “We are working on systems of pressuring, of applying pressure, the 1-2-2 or the neutral zone trap. It’s kind of something that we gave to the kids at the beginning; we haven’t really gone over as much as we would like to, obviously we need to go over it all.”

Pressure is what a St. Joseph by the Sea team felt thanks to goals from Joe Anile on a powerplay and Andrew Veglucci, both coming in the second period.

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“They’re always putting pressure on the puck so it’s tough to have a power play when you’ve got our kids skating around,” Bendl said of his team’s ability to kill penalties.

The problem was that pressure doesn’t necessarily stay where you want it.

Though the Vikings got a combined 20 minutes in the box, Chaminade’s biggest blow was the loss of defenseman Joe Anile, who was ejected for what was deemed a post check late in the second period.

“It was a premature whistle because they were jostling in front for the puck and he kinda like bumped him to get out of the way of the goalie and the kid more or less fell into the net and they said he cross-checked him from behind into the post,” Bendl said. “The game got a little away from us with the penalties.”

With Anile absent, St. Joseph lineman Phillip Garcia and Matthew Manfredi began to exert their influences on the Flyer lines, with Manfredi ending the shutout on an unassisted power play in the third then getting the assist on Thomas Altini’s net with 2:03 left in the game.

“We definitely had our guys, not really spot shadow them but follow them well, know where they are at all times,” Bendl said after the game. “It’s nothing that we did, the bounces just weren’t going our way.”

1 2 3 F St. Joseph by the Sea 0 0 2 2 Chaminade 0 2 0 2

 

Chaminade Scoring Statistics Player Goals Assts. Joe Anile 1 2 Andrew Veglucci 1 0

 

Chaminade Goalkeeping Goalie Shots Brandon Destasio 30


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