New Haven Register (Sunday) (New Haven, CT)
Wearing the crown
ND-WH beats Prep in title game for first time since ’99
WEST HAVEN — Notre Dame-West Haven had only beaten Fairfield Prep once in seven tries in the Southern Connecticut Conference Division I championship game.
It had been since 1999 — the year before the Division I final went on a 13-year hiatus — since the Green Knights had beaten the Jesuits for the league title.
But top-seeded and No. 1ranked Notre Dame (17-4-1) controlled things from start to finish to beat Fairfield Prep 3-0 Friday night for its fifth SCC Division I crown at Bennett Rink. It was also the Green Knights’ second SCC title in three years. They shut out Xavier 5-0 in 2022.
“Notre Dame is 0-6 in state championships and had only won one SCC title versus Prep,” Notre Dame coach Larry Vieira said. “It’s the second time we’ve left Prep on the ice in an SCC championship game. It was important for this team and we had to get rid of the ghosts. I think today we got rid of the ghosts.”
Notre Dame played almost a perfect game on the defensive end as Fairfield Prep wasn’t able to put much pressure on the Green Knights’ defense.
“Our mantra is if you don’t score against us, you can’t beat us,” Vieira said. “We spend a lot of time working in the defensive zone and on our forecheck. If we score goals along the way, that’s great.”
Goaltender Layne Jackson was named the Outstanding Player of the championship game.
“It’s hard to stay focused in games like this,” Jackson said. “My team was in the other zone the whole time. It’s hard with the student section. You have to stay locked in with all the distractions.”
Lukacs Delmonico put Notre Dame on top 1-0 just 6:28 into the opening period when he grabbed a rebound inside the crease and lifted it past the left shoulder of Prep goalie Charlie Rodrigue into the net for the goal.
The Green Knights, who outshot the Jesuits 16-9 in the second period, tacked on another goal midway through the period
to grab a 2-0 lead. Dylan Bankowski skated in back of the net and flipped a pass to Jason Anderson in front of the net and he put the puck past Rodrigue to give Notre Dame the twogoal edge.
“We know Prep struggles a little bit scoring this year, so we felt it was a fairly comfortable lead,” Vieira said. “We wanted to keep putting pressure on them as we knew their defense was tired.”
James Mascari tacked on an open net goal to make it 3-0 with 1:56 remaining in the game.
“Credit to them as they had more poise than we did,” Fairfield Prep coach Vin O’Hara said. “They executed their game plan and we were on our heels. We couldn’t string together multiple shifts in their zone and pinning them.”
Notre Dame will return to the ice March 9 in the second round of the CIAC Division I tournament at at Bennett Rink against the winner of the St. JosephXavier game. The Green Knights are seeded second.
Fairfield Prep (9-13) will play host to Greenwich Wednesday night at the Wonderland of Ice. The Jesuits
are the eighth seed.