Overwhelmed

By JOHN ENRIETTO Eagle Sports Editor

November 18, 2009 Last Updated: November 18, 2009 01:11 PM High School

Seneca Valley's Brandon Platt skates past David Gernhardt of Hempfield Tuesday in the Raiders 13-0 victory.

Raiders too much for outmanned Hempfield

WARRENDALE — Less than 30 seconds after the opening faceoff, Seneca Valley's Sam Jarrett scored on the game's first shot.

The shots — and the goals — kept on coming.

The Raiders outshot Hempfield 59-4 while posting a 13-0 high school hockey victory Tuesday night at Warrendale BladeRunners.

Hempfield (0-7), which played with only nine skaters and two goaltenders, has been outscored 67-5 this season.

"It's tough keeping the spirits up when you're in this situation," Hempfield coach John Florek said. "We've got two guys hurt, two others suspended. ... I can't put three full lines on the ice even when everybody's here."

Seneca Valley (6-0) scored three goals in the first period while outshooting Hempfield 24-1 in the first 15 minutes.

"I told our guys to go out and play our game during the first period," Raiders coach Denis Kirstein said. "We went after them. I don't want our players getting into any bad habits.

"Their goaltender made some big saves to keep them in it for a while."

Hempfield netminder Victor Nichols entered the game with an 8.76 goals-against average. The roof caved in on him during the second period.

The Raiders scored on seven of their first 16 shots in the period, including goals eight seconds apart, as their lead ballooned to 10-0 nine minutes into the period. Nichols was replaced at that point.

"We hung in there for a while, but then we just wore down," Florek said.

Hempfield had the lone power play of the night and surrendered a shorthanded goal to SV's Brandon Platt in the first period.

Jarrett wound up with three goals and three assists while Platt had three goals and two assists. Jarrett leads the Raiders in scoring with 12 points through six games.

Logan Pfeffer scored his team-leading sixth goal during the second-period onslaught.

"We had a full contingent of lines and defensive pairings tonight and it was only a matter of time before that won out," Kirstein said. "After a while, I moved some kids around. Some forwards played defense."

Kevin Rohm, Sean Sokolowski and Mike Pietrandea each scored their first goals of the season Tuesday.

Goalie Josh Hickey got the win for the Raiders, improving to 3-0. His save percentage is at .960.

Seneca Valley has outscored the opposition 34-7 so far this season.

"Because there's a national tournament this year, the regular season is so important," Kirastein said. "You can't afford to have a bad game."

The team with the best regular season winning percentage in PIHL Class AAA, AA, A and Open division will play a round-robin tournament to determine the league's representative in the national high school hockey tournament.

Seneca Valley 3 9 1 —13Hempfield 0 0 0 — 0First PeriodSV-Sam Jarrett 3 (Kaleb Schwab) :28;

SV-Bronson Dodd 2 (Tyer Mesisca) 3:03;

SV-Brandon Platt 3 SH (Jarrett) 8:18

Penalty: SV-Taylor Wagner (holding) 7:43

Second PeriodSV-Sean Sokolowski 1 (Jarrett, Platt) 1:56;

SV-Mike Pietrandea 1 (Dwerek Hathazy) 3:25;

SV-Kevin Rohm 1 (Schwab, Platt) 4:16;

SV-Mesisca 3 (Jarrett) 4:24;

SV-Jarrett 4 (Mesisca) 5:07;

SV-Logan Pfeffer 6 (Schwab) 7:39;

SV-Platt 4 (James Rankin, Mesisca) 9:00;

SV-Jarrett 5 (Wagner) 10:56;