Battle of defending champions
Detroit Catholic Central records resounding 7-1 win over Hartland
PLYMOUTH >> The Detroit Catholic Central Shamrocks and Hartland Eagles opened the new hockey season in a showdown of de- fending state champs, and the Shamrocks left little doubt who the better team is, at least at the start of the season, administering a 7-1 drubbing to the Eagles.
The defending Division 1 champion, Catholic Central needed just 10 seconds to get the opening goal.
The Shamrocks won the opening faceoff and flew down the ice where Landon West centered a puck for Jackson Walsh who was alone in front and quickly snapped home the puck for a 1-0 Catholic Central lead. The Shamrocks would never look back.
In some ways, the game was closer than the score would indicate as shots on goal were just 22-18 Catholic Central.
“I think it was good for both of us regardless of the score, regardless of the outcome just to play against another really quality opponent right off the get go and hopefully clean some things up in the long run,” Shamrocks head coach Brandon Kaleniecki said. “I think when we look at the game realisitically. It didn’t feel like a 7-1 game.”
But the Shamrocks punished seemingly every mistake the defending D2 champion Eagles made, especially in the neutral zone. A turnover at their own blue line by the Eagles led to another odd man rush and a goal by West. A bad line change by the Eagles
— goal CC on a clean breakaway. What the Shamrocks lacked in quantity of opportunities they more than made up for in quality as nearly every Catholic Central goal was a clean breakaway or an open shot from point blank range on a rush.
Hartland had long spells of solid play. The Eagles special teams were quite good on the night. Hartland killed off all six Shamrock power plays. And while the Hartland power play did not score on the night, coach Rick Gadwa was happy with the chances his team created in their two opportunities.
“I liked our kill. We killed off the five-on three. We killed off another couple five-onfours. I wish we would have had another couple looks with our power play, but we had some really good looks with our power play,” Gadwa said. “It’s rare. Special teams actually looked pretty good for not getting
through a lot of it yet at practice.”
Ultimately, Detroit Catholic Central’s depth shined through. The Shamrocks got seven goals from seven different players — Walsh, West, Griffin Crampton, Hero Schmidt, Andrew Urbain, Collin Dell, and Sebastiano Iavasile.
“That’s been one of our strengths every year. We certainly have some high end guys that are guys that we’re going to lean on and guys that are going to produce. But ultimately, what’s going to help push us to another level is those other guys that are going to contribute. It’s nice to have that. That’s a luxury, and some nights you’re not going to have that. Some nights those pucks are not going in, so we realize that
too,” Kaleniecki said.
Hartland’s lone goal came late in the second period off the stick of Lucas Henry.
Detroit Catholic Central (1-0) now travels to Ohio for a pair of weekend games before opening league play against Brother Rice next Wednesday.
Hartland (0-1) has a week off before traveling to Livonia Stevenson for another tough match up in a KLAA crossover game.
“I like losses. I think you can learn a lot from them. We learned a lot about ourselves. We’re going to have to find a way to just get stronger, faster, compete better and actually be able to use the brains a little bit more. So we’ve got a lot of work ahead of us,” Gadwa said. “CC is the best, year after year, and that’s a great measuring stick for us to start. We know where we’re at now. This game had to happen. We can now move forward.”