ADAMS TWP — Hockey teams get used to playing shorthanded. It's part of the game.

But not like this.

Mars posted a 6-5 overtime varsity high school hockey victory over Deer Lakes Tuesday at Warrendale Bladerunners without having its varsity team on the ice.

In fact, the Planets had only six skaters available for the entire night — all from their freshmen and junior varsity teams. Even varsity coach Tim Coleman wasn't behind the bench Tuesday.

"We found ourselves in a hostile situation at our game in Johnstown (Jan. 15) and paid a price for it,"Coleman said.

The Planets defeated Somerset, 5-1, that evening, but were whistled for nearly 15 penalties and wound up in a brawl on the ice.

"We don't advocate that stuff, but there's a time a team has to defend itself,"Coleman said. "This was not the fault of Mars hockey. We were accosted on the ice by players and officials ... That's the best way to describe it."

Some players left the Mars bench during the scuffle. Coleman said he was told that officials could not determine what players left the bench, so all the players received a one-game suspension.

If the Planets were to forfeit their next game, the suspensions would carry over to the next scheduled game.

"They're not really suspensions. It's a USAHockey rule that players who receive a game misconduct must sit out the next game,"PIHLCommissioner Ed Sam said. "I haven't seen the officials' report from that night, so I can't determine what precipitated those penalties."

While the Mars team received game misconducts, only one Somerset player received such a penalty.

"We're 12-1 and they're 0-12,"Coleman said. "Playing on their ice, they were taking shots at us ... It just wasn't a good place for us to be."

Coleman said he considered forfeiting the Deer Lakes game and paying the $1,000 fine for doing so to the league, until he found out the suspensions wouldn't go away.

He decided to put a team on the ice against Deer Lakes (3-11-1), asking the players to survive more than win.

Varsity assistant coach Steve Meyers — who missed the Somerset game due to work commitments — and junior varsity coach Steve Neese coached the Planets Tuesday.

Their roster consisted of varsity goalie Martin Lamneck, junior varsity goalie Nick Mathlage, and JV/freshman players Matt Davison, Kevin Leslie, Josh Booher, Rusty Miller, Blake Friday and Tyler Thomas.

"You need a minimum of six players to be able to play a game,"Sam said. "You can play with an empty net if you want to, though I haven't seen that."

Miller, a freshman, played his first-ever varsity game. Friday, a sophomore defenseman, played his second and scored two goals — the game-tying tally late in the third period and the game-winner with 22 seconds left in overtime.

Mars took a 4-2 lead into the third period before falling behind.

"We sent one player after the puck and kept three players back the whole game to conserve energy,"Friday said. "By the third period, we were pretty tired.

"When they took the lead on us, we had to win this game somehow. Our adrenaline was pretty high."

Meyers said the Planets substituted for a player after every whistle.

"We implemented a trap system of having one player chase the puck while others laid back defensively,"he said. "If we played our normal style, our kids would have been done before the first period was half over.

"The kids had never practiced that system before and their execution was amazing. They (Deer Lakes) had a full bench, we had virtually no bench. Our mind-set was to keep it close.

"Honestly?I'm very surprised we won,"Meyers added.

Mars is locked in behind Serra Catholic in seeding for the upcoming PIHLClass Aplayoffs. The Planets have won 10 straight games since a 6-3 loss to Serra Catholic on Nov. 6.

"We weren't worried about those two points. We just didn't want to get anybody hurt,"Coleman said. "It's an atrocity for the league to put any team in a situation like this.

"This game was a tribute to the depth of our program and the conditioning of those kids."

Booher scored two goals for Mars. Friday scored the game-winner off a faceoff, with a teammate in the penalty box.

"They won the faceoff and the puck was going between their two defensemen,"Friday said. "I poked it past them and wound up with a breakaway.

"I've been playing hockey since I was 6. I'll remember this game for a long, long time."