The News Herald (Willoughby, OH)
NDCL comeback bid falls short
Notre Dame-Cathedral Latin needed its Baron Cup III opening-round encounter with Bay on Feb. 4 to be about 47 minutes, not the standard 45.
No way around it, the Lions registered a thud in the opening period, then spent the rest of the evening trying to atone for it. That comeback bid was commendable, but fell short.
Brendan Boland, Nathan Lah and Matthew Salamone netted goals in the third to make it interesting, but the comeback was not completed as NDCL dropped a 5-4 decision to the scrappy, short-handed Rockets.
There wasn’t much need for deep contemplation postgame for Lions coach Bernie Kosloski, because it was evident where this game went south.
“We had a tough time getting started,” Kosloski said. “They’ve got two kids who are really nice players. Their goaltender played solid the whole game. We were talking them up: We’re not going to score goals on that first shot. Pepper them, and follow up for rebounds. We got them gassed, finally, and they started slowing down. And we swung the momentum ... too little, too late.”
By 5:29 of the second, when Rockets standout freshman Henry Sjoberg slotted a lovely look on the backhand from the top of the left circle, the Lions found themselves down, 5-0.
Fellow freshman staple Dylan Vidmar struck twice in the opening period, and
THE SCORE BAY 5, NDCL 4
Sjoberg later struck 89 seconds apart, the latter on a breakaway skating in from the neutral zone for a shorthanded tally, to open a 4-0 lead after one.
NDCL, capitalizing in part on the fact Bay operated with just seven skaters and one goaltender, nearly came all the way back.
Anthony Giudice hammered in a backhand look between the circles at 8:29 of the second, skating to the bench and encouraging he and his teammates to continue chipping away.
The Lions dropped the hammer in the third with a 16-1 shots advantage and almost took enough chips to break through.
Boland did well with a wraparound at 8:26 to pull within 5-2.
Then Lah slotted a chance on the left side of
“We ran out of time. If we would have had another minute or two, I think we would have come out with a ‘W.’ But that first period put us back on our heels.” — NDCL coach Bernie Kosloski
the crease at 12:29. And Salamone got his stick down in front with 42 seconds left to make it a 5-4 game.
That’s where however.
“We ran out of time,” Kosloski said. “If we would have had another minute or two, I think we would have come out with a ‘W.’ But that first period put us back on our heels.” NDCL is coming it stayed, off a quarantine, so its previous game before heading to Brooklyn came Jan. 16.
Given the extent other News-Herald coverage area squads have been affected by the pandemic, though, Kosloski laudably doesn’t use rust as an excuse.
“I don’t want to blame the quarantine,” Kosloski said. “We had a pretty good year when we look back. We were one of the lucky teams and played 15 or so games. We had to shut down there for two weeks. There’s other teams that haven’t really had it so lucky.
“I don’t want to blame the quarantine. It does throw you off when you don’t touch the ice for two weeks. But you still try to keep things going through Zoom meetings and remote discussions. But it’s not the same. I think, again, just lack of intensity in the first period. They stepped up, and they put the puck in the net.”