Recaps for games of March 12 & 13
’Dog-day afternoon
Molinaro’s 47 stops not enough to save
Bobcats in title-game loss to Bulldogs;
Romano makes commitment to Cornell
Age. Experience. Physical strength.
The Boston Bulldogs led the league in all three this season, and that was the difference in their 4-1 victory over the New York Junior Bobcats in the AJHL championship game Sunday, March 13 in Salem, New Hampshire.
“Overall when you have to put your finger on it, they’re just an older, stronger team than us,” said Bobcats General Manager Ron Kinnear, noting that Bulldogs coach Mike Adessa effectively matched his lines against New York’s high-octane offense while deploying a neutral-zone trap. “He kind of neutralized our speed. He didn’t allow us to get going.”
Sparked by the trap and some relentless forechecking, Boston dominated the Bobcats in the ninth and final meeting between the two teams this season. The AJHL regular-season champion Bulldogs outshot New York, 51 to 30, and only a superb effort from goaltender Chris Molinaro (Nesconset, NY) kept the Bobcats from being blown out.
“It was an eye-opener. I didn’t expect the Bulldogs to open it up like that. I thought they would play a defensive game, but firing 52 shots on net isn’t exactly the New Jersey Devils,” said Molinaro, referring to a trap that has become the NHL’s preeminent style and has made the Devils a perennial Stanley Cup contender. “They were dominant physically. It was the most anybody ever dominated a game against us.”
The title game snapped what had been a 4-4 stalemate between the Eastern Seaboard rivals during the regular season. And for the Southern Division champion Bobcats, it provided an unfitting ending to a season that saw them earn several postseason honors. While Molinaro was named the league’s top goaltender and forward Vlady Nikiforov (Hauppauge, NY/Hauppauge H.S.) its MVP, Bobcats head coach Aleksey Nikiforov was named Coach of the Year.
“They’re just physically bigger and stronger,” coach Nikiforov said of the Bulldogs, most of whom are two and three years older than the Bobcats. “They are ’84- and ’85[-born], and we don’t have that. We’re mainly ’86, ’87 and ’88.”
By winning in such convincing fashion, the Bulldogs proved that age is more than just a number. A defensive-zone turnover resulted in the go-ahead goal early in the second period, and the Bulldogs scored on a 2-on-1 to make it 3-1 less than two minutes later.
“They threw two looks at us. They threw at us a hard check that gave us absolutely no chance to set up,” Molinaro said of the Bulldogs, “and then, when we had time to set up, they trapped us and we couldn’t go anywhere.”
But the most impressive number of the day was 47 – as in 47 saves for Molinaro, who was named the game’s first star despite the loss. The SUNY Plattsburgh-bound Molinaro ended his Bobcats career in impressive fashion, stopping 71 of 76 shots (93.4 percent) on the weekend.
“He came up big,” said forward Tony Romano (Smithtown, NY/St. Anthony’s H.S.), who led the Bobcats with three goals and five assists in an 11-1 semifinal win over the New Jersey Rockets on Saturday. “He kept us in that game.”
“It was a tremendous effort from Chris Molinaro,” coach Nikiforov said. “He was outstanding. That’s why he was [the league’s] goalie of the year.”
“He made a lot of key saves, or the game couldn’t have been worse than it was,” Kinnear said. “It was nice to see him go out on that note.”
“It was a nice way to end everything with the Bobcats,” Molinaro said, “and it was a big confidence booster, too. There were a lot of good goalies in the AJHL, and the fact the league thought that much of me is really a big compliment.”
Perhaps the biggest compliment paid to Romano this year was the interest Cornell University showed him. Romano, who verbally committed to attend the Division I Ivy League power on Saturday morning, played his best game of the season on Saturday afternoon.
“Tony had a real strong game,” Molinaro said. “I think him committing to college really got the monkey off his back. I think he was putting a lot of pressure on himself.”
Romano was noticeably loose against New Jersey, a team the Bobcats needed overtime to defeat in the March 6 regular-season finale. His rebound in front midway through the second period sparked a string of five scores in span of 3:41, but his prettiest goal gave the Bobcats a 2-1 lead 6:31 into the first period. It also ended up being the game-winner. Forward Nick Grasso (Kings Park, NY/Kings Park H.S.) got the puck along the Bobcats’ blue line and fed Romano at mid-ice. From there, Romano beat his defender with a toe-drag before backhanding the puck past New Jersey goalie Kevin Bendel.
“I felt relieved. There was less pressure to perform well,” Romano said. “I just felt very good. I was very confident going into that game.”
“Every time Tony Romano got on the ice, something happened in [the Rockets’] net,” coach Nikiforov said. “So it was Romano’s day.”
Not to be forgotten, however, were strong games from Nikiforov (1G, 2A), Grasso (4A) and forwards Jarrett Gold (East Setauket, NY/Suffolk CC), James Marcou (Smithtown, NY/Smithtown H.S.) and Patrick Moriarty (Lloyd Harbor, NY/Nassau CC). While Marcou (1G, 4A) and Moriarty (1G, 2A) joined Romano as playmakers, Gold reassumed the finisher’s role with a hat trick, including two goals during the same shift. But the most memorable goal for coach Nikiforov came on the penalty kill. Marcou’s shorthanded tally, which put the Bobcats up 8-1 with 14:14 left in the game, came on criss-cross play in the high slot area off a drop pass from Romano.
All told, Romano was involved in eight of the Bobcats’ 11 goals, netting each of the first three and either scoring or assisting seven of the first eight. It was a solid showing from a player who led the team and league in scoring for most of the season but had tailed off his torrid early season pace over the past two months.
“We kidded him that if he could have made that decision [to attend Cornell] before we played Apple Core,” said Kinnear, referring to the Bobcats’ 4-2 loss in the finals of the Northwood School Invitational January 23, “then maybe he would have had the same results against them.”
Romano is the fifth member of the 2004-05 Bobcats team to commit to a college program. But while Molinaro is headed to D-III Plattsburgh this fall, Romano, Nikiforov, Marcou and Grasso – the latter three of whom gave their verbal commitment to attend D-I UMass-Amherst – won’t enter the collegiate ranks until the 2006-07 season at the earliest.
The 2005-06 Bobcats will lose several players from this year’s team, including Marcou (a member of the U.S. National Team Development Program) and Nikiforov (who is likely to play in either the USHL or Quebec). So it will be up to players like Romano to use this year’s title-game experience as motivation for next year’s playoff tournament.
“I have to step up,” Romano said, “especially with Vlady gone.”
“I think we all wanted it,” Romano said of the AJHL championship, “but I think it just came down to them [the Bulldogs] being bigger and stronger than us.”
That means Romano and the rest of the Bobcats’ returning players must dedicate much of the off-season to getting themselves in tip-top physical shape. Coach Nikiforov said the Bulldogs’ superior conditioning played a big role in the title-game loss.
“First of all, it’s physical conditioning. Why are you mentally weaker than the other guys?” the coach asked. “Because you’re physically weaker. Physical strength gives you confidence.”
Nevertheless, Kinnear and coach Nikiforov are confident next year’s team won’t suffer a dropoff despite the depatures of both the league’s leading scorer (Vlady Nikiforov) and goaltender (Molinaro).
“We’ll be a year older, a year wiser and more expeirienced. And we won’t be changing the roster as much as we did last year,” said Kinnear, noting that several stars from the Suffolk PAL team should step up to the Junior Bobcats program, which will maintain about 65 percent of its current roster. “I think we’ll be in a good position to have another strong team next year. The coaching staffs will stay intact with both teams, so I think there will be some continuity there. So we won’t have to rebuild. We’ll just have to reload.”
For more information on the New York Junior Bobcats, go to www.nybobcats.com. Have a question? Send an email to nybobcatshockey@yahoo.com.
SATURDAY, MARCH 12: AJHL SEMIFINALS
1 2 3 FINAL
New Jersey Rockets 1 0 0 1
NEW YORK BOBCATS 2 5 4 11
Goals – NYB: Romano (assisted by Grasso and Marcou; 5:56 1st), Romano (Grasso, Marcou; 6:31 1st), Romano (Leone, Moriarty; 11:21 2nd), Gold (Nikiforov, Romano; 12:18 2nd), Gold (Gorman, Nikiforov; 13:26 2nd), DeLuca (Grasso, Romano; 14:33 2nd), Moriarty (Marcou, Romano; 15:02 2nd), Marcou (Romano; 5:46 3rd, SH), Nikiforov (Grasso; 7:15 3rd), Gold (Moriarty, White; 16:48 3rd), Gagnon (Marcou, Romano; 18:02 3rd); NJR: Maguire (unassisted; 0:52 1st). Saves – NYB: Molinaro 24 (25 shots, 38 minutes), Spagnoli 9 (9 shots, 22 minutes); NJR: Bendel 36 (47 shots, 60 minutes).
SUNDAY, MARCH 13: AJHL CHAMPIONSHIP
1 2 3 FINAL
NEW YORK BOBCATS 1 0 0 1
Boston Bulldogs 1 3 0 4
Goals – NYB: Gagnon (DeLuca, Coppola; 10:08 1st); BB: Shelzi (unassisted; N/A 1st), Moore (Hamashima, Moreton; N/A 2nd), Karlov (Costa; N/A 2nd), Hamashima (Moore; N/A 2nd) . Saves – NYB: Molinaro 47 (51 shots, 60 minutes); BB: Beauregard 29 (30 shots, 60 minutes).
