Michael Wilson got the puck on the left wing. He scanned the ice and put a shot on cage. The West Essex goalie was screened by a swarm of Westfield players. The next thing he knew, the lamp was lit, and the Blue Devils had taken a 1-0 lead. After losing to West Essex twice during the regular season, and being forced to play from behind, Westfield was now in the driver’s seat.
Westfield coach Joe Bertucci reiterated the importance of jumping out to a lead. “When you’re playing with the lead, you have confidence to be able to execute your game plan,” he said. Westfield would go on to execute the game plan well, winning 6-0 and advancing to the McInnis Cup final.
One of the reasons Westfield was so dominant was because of power plays. Penalties were the kryptonite for the Knights, as clear through Westfield’s four power play goals.
“We usually don’t get power plays, so I’m happy we got a couple, and we have the players to do it and the system to do it, it just becomes a matter of getting power play goals and we did that today,” said Bertucci.
On the topic of power play goals, Westfield scored four times with an extra man. The first of which came in period number one. Chicola got the puck adjacent to the net. He then faked his shot, juking out many defenders, including the goalie, and of course he finished it off with a goal. Thanks to the first power play goal, the Blue Devils now led 2-0.
The second period started off with a bang for the Blue Devils. Power play attempt number two was in the near future, and the Blue Devils once again looked to capitalize. With swift passing the puck ended up on Wilson’s stick. From there he wound back and fired a shot that deflected off a West Essex defender and past the goaltender into the back of the net. The Blue Devils now led by three and were 2/2 on power plays.
The Blue Devil lead over the once-fierce Knights only grew from there. West Essex found itself on another penalty kill with 7 minutes left in the second period, giving the Blue Devils a third attempt on the power play. Wilson found the puck once again. He ducked behind the net and squeezed the puck past the Knight’s goalies’ left foot. Wilson’s highlight goal had completed the hat trick, and the energy only flowed from there.
“Everyone out on the ice really just wanted it. We played our team game, and we knew that’s what we needed to do to come out with a win,” explained Wilson.
The Knights continued to stay in the gifting spirit as they gave the Blue Devils a fourth attempt on the power play. After scoring on their previous three attempts, the Blue Devils wanted to go 4/4. Alex Ebel had the puck on the right side of the net and knew what he had to do. He fired a rocket into the left side of the net, beating the goalie. Westfield now led 5-0.
The Blue Devils refused to give the Knights any room to maneuver. They stayed in control throughout the third period, even finding points to continue to apply pressure. Daniel Duffy was able to lengthen the gap between the two teams when he skated past the blue line towards the Knight’s goaltender and fired a shot on net. Duffy connected for his seventh goal on the season, sealing victory for the Blue Devils.
While it may seem as if the Blue Devils breezed through the Knights, that would be the opposite of what was true for a large portion of the game. For example, in period number one, before the Blue Devils jumped out to a lead, the Knights looked to strike first. They could only look to strike first, however, because Westfield’s Andrew Raber refused to let anything by him. Raber saved every shot he faced to pitch a shutout. Raber’s performance tonight was fueled by his great mindset.
“I think coming into the game with a mindset of just having fun out there,” Raber said. “Before in the season, when we had that slump, and went like 0-4-1, I think I had the mindset of you have to be focused. You have to be locked in is what my teammates would say. And you just have to be focused on what the puck is doing. Then it just changed to having fun, stopping the puck, and I have seen success recently with that so I came to have that mindset, and I’d say it worked out pretty well.” Raber added that the film watched by the Blue Devils was a key contributor for the stout Blue Devil defense.
The Blue Devils will look to continue their success on both ends of the ice on Wednesday in the McInnis Cup final against bitter rival Summit. The two will square off at 8:15 p.m. at Richard J. Codey Arena, with the Blue Devils looking to avenge their loss from the Union County Tournament semifinal.
