Sluggish start proves costly to Mars in 4-1 home defeat
WARRENDALE — The Plum hockey team made Mars work for every thing the Planets got Monday night at the Baierl Ice Complex.
Battling on the boards, denying scoring chances and forcing turnovers were the key elements to the Mustangs scoring a 4-1 win.
Being prepared for a fight every night is something Mars, which fell to 7-3 and is in its first season in Class AA, is still adjusting to.
“In Single A, two-thirds of the teams you could walk around and do whatever you want and put the puck in the back of the net and go home,” Planets forward Jonathan Kowalkowski said. “That team (Plum), I respect that team. They have a lot of hard workers and you can’t beat the guy every time you dump in. You have to go in there, hit him and battle him to get the puck.”
The Mustangs (7-3) were able to play their style by scoring early. Dillon Morello wristed a shot past Mars goaltender Tyler Spreng 58 seconds in.
The Planets were never able to tie the game. Plum doubled its lead when Domenic Borriello pushed a rebound through Spreng’s legs in the second period.
“I think we did it to ourselves,” Mars coach Steve Meyers said. “We didn’t show up for the first eight minutes of the first period and we’re down (1)-0 right away. ... We were all over them in the second and we couldn’t bang one in. ”
Both teams finished with 24 shots on goal. Mars didn’t have a ton of great scoring chances, but did apply a lot of pressure in the second period.
The Planets held a 14-3 edge in shots on goal. Plum’s focus was making sure those chances didn’t come from in close.
Mustangs goalie Nathan Puhala finished with 23 saves, while Spreng made 20 stops.
“We had to keep them to the outside and most of their shots were from the outside,” Plum coach Vinnie Somma said. “We outworked them. We dumped the puck in and kept them flustered in their zone.”
When Kowalkowski registered Mars’ lone goal, which cut the lead to 2-1, it didn’t come easy. Beau Heakins won a battle behind the net and slid the puck to Kowalkowski.
Kowalowski was able to lift the puck up on a backhand with 10:33 remaining.
“I feel like we created plays and the goalies made nice saves,” Kowalkowski said. “That goalie is solid upstairs. We have to send the puck to the net on that goalie and crash him.”
Plum was able to seal the win with two late goals by Dillon Joyce.
Meyers didn’t think the loss was devastating, but thinks the Planets need to regroup a bit.
Mars was out of system early and Plum worked hard to frustrate the Planets.
“During one shift in the first period, I counted seven turnovers,” Meyers said. “You can’t do that and win against good teams in AA. We wanted to reinforce to the boys with the step up in class we have to show up for every game. There’s still kind of that single A mentality where it’s Monday, I’m tired or whatever. You can’t get by with that at this level.”
