GREAT STRIDES
Czerneckianair, Citara lead 18U team to victory
WOONSOCKET — The names on the back of the Mount St. Charles Hockey Academy 18U jerseys are supposed to help fans and college coaches quickly identity players, but it’s also helping the Mounties themselves.
The team gathered for the first time just two weeks ago and played their first five games of the season last weekend at the Labor Day Cup in Salem, N.H. Saturday was another milestone for the program in its embryonic stages – it’s first home game at Adelard Arena against the visiting New Jersey Rockets.
While it was far from perfect – the Mounties took nine penalties, many of which were completely unnecessary – Mount secured a 3-1 victory thanks to the play of a number of the squad’s Division I college commits. Quinnipiac-bound center Victor Czerneckianair and PC-bound winger Michael Citara each scored a goal and were superb on the penalty kill to improve the squad’s season record to 4-1-1.
“Honestly, the first day we came together it seemed like everyone loved each other, so it was really easy to mesh from the start,” Czerneckianair said. “Basically, we just became one family in the first week. Over time playing with [Citara] we’re going to be a real threat because he’s a very good player. There’s going to be a lot of goals between us two.”
“I thought we competed really well, but I thought we were sloppy,” Mount coach Matt Plante said. “We were good enough. We’re only going to get better. If you look at some of the things we were doing structurally, our penalty kill is night-and-day better than last week. Our defensive zone play was pretty good. Even though we were sloppy, I never felt like we gave them much in the offensive zone.”
The 18U squad was the final of Mount’s four teams to play Saturday and that will be the case again Sunday when the squad looks to finish off the weekend sweep of the Rockets when the teams meet at 2 p.m. It was almost a perfect home opener for the program because the 14U and the 15-year-old squads both posted impressive victories.
The only disappointment of the day came in the second game of the quadrupleheader when the talented 16U squad threw away a two-goal second-period lead in a 5-4 loss. Forward Kenny Connors, who is already committed to play at Massachusetts, produced a goal and an assist, while highly-rated Canadian forward Zac Bolduc was impressive with an assist.
“Obviously the 16s was a little disappointing because I didn’t see that happening, but it was good to see three out of the four teams get the wins,” said Plante, who is charge of the entire academy along with 16U coach Devin Rask. “We’re pleased with that, but we’d like to go four for four.”
After the 16U squad lost, the Jim Creamer-coached 15U squad continued its strong start to the season. Former Hendricken standout Brady Berard, North Kingstown’s Cam O’Neill and Cranston’s Perry Gaudreau all produced a point in a 4-1 victory. Jackson Graber led the way with a goal and an assist.
While the 16U and 15s games didn’t feature too much physical play or too many penalties, the same can’t be said of the final game of the day where the squads combined for 18 penalties along with a mini-brawl in the opening period. The Mounties grabbed the lead just 4:58 into the opening period when Citara scored a power-play goal.
Mount was called for too-many men later in the period and the visitors tied the score at 15:08 when Aidan Sebcowski took a pass from Kyle Contessa and put a shot past Ethan Pearson.
“I was a little bit irritated by some of the behind-the-play penalties we committed,” Plante said. “They scored a goal after we had too many men on the ice. Those type of things are controllable. We can control our composure after a whistle and we can control a line change. After that first goal, we did a good job of tucking in our lip and killing the penalties and building momentum.”
Czerneckianair, who did a superb job with Citara, Karl Ste-Marie and Cole Crusberg-Roseen of killing penalties, gave his team a lead it would never relinquish just 2:40 into the second period. The Southington, Conn. native ripped a shot from the left circle past goalie Dean Antala.
While it might seem odd for a number of kids who have already committed to play college hockey to uproot their lives for one season to play at Mount, Czerneckianair said the reason he’s in Woonsocket is very simple.
“Honestly, it’s all about the coaches. The coaches here are amazing,” Czerneckianair said. “These are the best coaches in the world and everyone wants to play for them.”
After a pretty even opening two periods, Mount simply dominated the third period, outshooting the Rockets 13-0. An insurance goal finally came with just under five minutes remaining in the contest when Crusberg-Roseen scored from the top of the circles.
“This whole team is going to get better once we figure out who each other is and once we get used to the new school and make that adjustment,” Plante said. “Once we figure out our identity, we’re getting there with the foundation of our structure. Once those pieces come together, it’s really going to be exciting to see where we’re at.
“We know what we want to be: we want to be a disciplined – meaning no stupid penalties – along with being a hard, fast, heavy hockey team.”