After a loss to the defending state champions Plano West, the Jesuit Hockey team knew that they had to bounce back against their next opponents, McKinney and Allen. Knowing that the two teams are not having the most auspicious season, Jesuit would have to play to their strengths, while still dominating the areas that they are not as proficient in, and dominate is exactly what they did.
Jesuit started off playing McKinney on Thursday, November 20th. The team knew that they had to improve upon their lackluster performance against Plano in order to ensure their victory as well as gain some sort of momentum heading into the latter part of their schedule this season. “We knew they outnumbered us player-wise, so we had to come out and finish strong” said goalie George McBey ’16. Jesuit’s plan going into the game was simple, yet effective: play to their strengths, mainly their speed and athleticism, and finish aggressively enough to send a message to other teams that there would be no easy game played against these Rangers.
In the first period, the score remained 0-0; however, Jesuit managed to lead in shots by a huge amount, amassing sixteen shots on goal while only surrendering a mere six shots on goal. This gave Jesuit a huge boost of confidence: “We remained in their end for most of the period, keeping the pressure on their goalie and defense to make big stops, rather than putting it on our own shoulders,” McBey said. Then, late in the first period, the scoring started. Villi Lappalainen ’15, netted the first goal of the game, and shortly afterwards, Michael Schmidt ’16 put another one in the back of the net to make the score 2-0 in the first period’s final minutes. This gave Jesuit the cushion they needed to relax and play what they like to call “Jesuit Hockey.”
The second and third period played out much like the first, with a goal from sophomore and leading scorer Carson Platt in just the opening seconds of the second period. However, Villi Lappalainen proved it was his night by netting three more goals in the second period, pushing his total for the game to four goals. With the game put away, Jesuit backed off from their attack coasted to a handy 6-1 victory over McKinney.
This momentum transferred over to Jesuit’s next game on December 5th, when the Rangers took on the Allen Eagles in hopes of their second win in a row. Like McKinney, Jesuit knew that by stepping on the Eagles’ wings early, they could secure a victory. Stepping on their wings would come to be a bit of an understatement as the game unfolded.
Throughout the game, Jesuit dismantled the Eagles defense and goalie in what Nick Mersch ’16 would call “Blackhawk-like domination from the Rangers.” From the opening period, Jesuit began scoring goals and keeping the pressure on Allen’s defense by dominating them in their own zone and forcing the Eagles to make mistakes in critical areas. Jesuit, throughout the course of the game, ended up getting goals from almost six different players, four of which had multi-point games, including Junior Michael Schmidt and once again Villi Lappalainen. Jesuit rolled over the Eagles with a crushing final score of 10-1. “The Eagles did not fly that night and ended up being shot down before they could even lift off,” said Mersch.
These back to back wins for Jesuit are exactly what they needed in order to get back on track and regain some much needed morale and confidence. These wins helped affirm to the Jesuit players that they “have a lot of talent this year, and when we bring it together and perform as one cohesive unit, our only competition is ourselves,” well put by goalie George McBey. Hopefully, this new found burst of confidence can continue through the rest of the season in hopes of reclaiming the same glory of two years ago, where the Rangers won the state championship.
