Lady Rebels remain unbeaten

From the Wicked Local Walpole website:

   When this year’s hockey season started the Walpole High boys were planning on being able to keep up with the rest of the Bay State Herget, which they have with a 5-1 record.
What they didn’t expect, however, was to have to work as hard to keep up with their female counterparts at the Iorio Arena.
   Following Saturday night’s game in Walpole, in which the girls’ hockey team beat Newton North for the first time ever, Coach Joe Verderber’s Rebels were still unbeaten, with a 5-0-1 slate, the only mark on the record a 1-all tie with Braintree.
   Like the Wamps, the Tigers – whose only loss going in was to Framingham in the season opener – were expected to be a tourney team and the experienced program has had Walpole’s number every game in the Rebels’ short history. No longer.
   Thanks to another outstanding job in net by senior Captain Sue Cunniff, an amazing performance by the whole defense and timely offense, including Kristen Morrissey’s first goal of the year, the Rebels came out of the Iorio with a hard-fought, well-earned 4-3 victory over the Tigers.
   Playing late Saturday in front of a much larger crowd than one would anticipate, the Lady Rebels certainly gave fans their money’s worth.
   One of the biggest plays came with 6:45 left in the third.
   A North forward had brought the puck in and taken a hard shot that Cunniff stonewalled. The puck bounced off her blocker toward the right defense circle, where another Newton forward was waiting. Cunniff dove headlong to her right to protect her right post.
   Seeing her teammate was in trouble, defenseman Vittoria Petrillo then dove back toward the net to block any shot that might have been placed to Cunniff’s left.
   That was just one of many excellent plays turned in by Petrillo, Lauren Whitmore, Hannah Feeley, Tori Richardson and the rest of the defense in what has to be the best game ever played by the blue liners.
   Their play, combined with the great goaltending of both Cunniff and Steph Kelley, are the reason why the Rebels have only allowed seven goals in six games. Newton’s Hannah Jellinek, who had two goals each in wins over Braintree and Norwood, matched her previous out but the rest of the team was shut down.
   Balanced firepower led by Steph Frye and Julia Tosone and augmented recently by Jacqui Dolan is the reason why the Rebels now have 29 goals after Saturday’s game, already matching last year’s season total. Putting them both together is the reason why the Rebels are unbeaten a third of the way through the season and just four wins away from their first post-season appearance ever.
   “They made a lot of mistakes tonight,” admitted Verderber, “but they were shooting the puck and kept coming back. That’s what kept us in it.”
   Right now their biggest enemy against an experienced team is their own relative inexperience, especially at holding a lead, something the Rebels are not used to. Every once in a while they break down in their end, losing track of the puck as they try to regroup.
   That accounted for Newton’s first score in the first period. After a scoreless first ten minutes, punctuated by nice stops by both Cunniff and Newton North’s Courtney Leahy, the Rebels finally broke through.
   Tosone had tracked down a loose puck, and then shipped it over to Michelle Lennon, who put it away at 10:18. But just 32 seconds later, the Tigers were on the doorstep and left wing Jellinek finished off a wing-to-wing pass across the front by Morgan Abbott.
   The teams traded goals again in the second after the first ended in the 1-1 tie. Shortly after the first line in the middle stanza left the ice, the trio of Lennon, Tosone ad Dolan was back out there, keeping the Tigers pinned in their own end under a barrage of shots.
   At 2:02 Tosone got her second assist when she set up Dolan, making it 2-1.
“Jacqui’s been big,” offered Verderber. “She’s had four goals the last three games, starting with two against Weymouth.”
   Newton North again fought hard for the equalizer, and finally made it 2-2 at 38:17 of the second with first-line center Katie Caruso finishing off a 2-on-1 break started by Abbott.
The Tigers kept the pressure on and almost got their first lead with 9:04 left, but Cunniff made a great save and managed to tie up the puck.
   Then the Rebels started taking it to the Tigers again in a bid to retake the lead. Shots by Morrissey, Whitmore and Kelsey Cosby were stopped in less than two minutes during a Leahy clinic in net, but the Rebels kept pressing on.
   At 13:01 they got a break when a Tiger was whistled off for high-sticking but the quartet of Kim Gillies, Jellinek, Amanda Taylor and Alyssa Hanson did an excellent job of killing the penalty against Walpole’s power play unit of Cosby, Frye, Kellie Duffy, Whitmore and Feeley for much of the power play.
   Finally, just when it was nearly over, the Rebels popped in their third goal to take the lead for the third time.
   With 10 seconds left on the power play Walpole won a face-off in Newton’s end and the puck sprung out to Dolan. She then fed Tosone between the circles. Taking advantage of a screen the red-hot Rebel, who overtook Frye as the team scoring leader, one-timed a power play goal with 40 seconds left in the period.
   The teams went into the third with the Rebels nursing a 3-2 lead. It was not surprising considering how equal the teams were in skills and opportunities. After the Tigers outshot the hosts just 7-6 the first period, the Rebels only entertained an 8-6 advantage in the second.
   The game was obviously coming down to who wanted it more, and the Rebels certainly made their case.
   A minute and 14 seconds into the last stanza Feeley grabbed the puck in Walpole’s zone during intense Newton pressure. Deftly deking Abbott along the boards in her zone, Feeley then carried the puck to center ice for the clear.
   With 10:45 left Petrillo picked up a loose puck behind Walpole’s net and carried it coast to coast into Newton’s zone.
   Despite all that it was the Tigers who scored next, at 5:35. Caruso got to a loose puck in the zone before Walpole could get to it and blasted a shot on Cunniff. Cunniff got her glove partially on it, making the save, but Jellinek swooped in to the right post and hammered in the rebound.
The Rebels had nine and a half minutes to win the game, and got to it, starting with Lennon picking Gillies’ pocket in the Newton zone before she could clear.
   Petrillo made a pinpoint pass to Tosone for a rush, and when Newton came roaring back, Petrillo made her dive.
   Newton was hit with a penalty with 6:51 left and under intense pressure with 5:15 to go the Tigers were forced into icing the puck.
   There was no call but it didn’t matter. Shortly thereafter Morrissey picked up the puck and buried it in the right side of the net.
 

Read “Lady Rebels remain unbeaten” on the Wicked Local Walpole website