The Whaler boys hockey team squashed the grapes Sunday afternoon, running Martha’s Vineyard out of their own building with a 4-1 victory to improve their record to 2-1 this season.
“This is all a process and we are supposed to get better every week, every practice, every game, and we are getting better every game,” head coach Scott Corbett said. “It was nice to be at full strength and have our top two lines. I thought we played really well. We installed a new forecheck for this game and these guys did a really great job executing it.”
Riley Williams led the way for Nantucket all game long. He scored the first of his two goals on a power play six minutes into the game by jamming a loose puck past the Vineyard goalie to give the Whalers a 1-0 lead they would take into the first intermission
“I still feel like we should be shooting a little bit more,” Corbett said. “I think we are looking for that perfect goal too much. But it was great to get that first one that allowed us to play with a lead.”
Nantucket’s offense exploded in the second period. It all began with Williams scoring his second power play goal on a slap shot from the left faceoff dot to make it 2-0.
Three minutes later defenseman Hunter Strojny extended the Whaler’s lead. He let a wrist shot go from the point that had eyes and somehow found its way through a bunch of bodies in front of the Vineyard goalie and made its way to the back of the net with 7:28 to go in the second period to give Nantucket a 3-0 lead.
The Whalers landed the final blow a few minutes later to put the game out of reach. Center Cosmo Tedeschi began to streak down the right side of the ice when winger Jack Billings flipped a puck off high glass in the Whaler defensive zone to clear the puck and get it to center ice.
The puck made its way past the Whaler’s offensive blue line and as soon as Tedeschi gained possession of the puck he showed off impressive vision with a backhand pass to a streaking Cole Evens coming down the ice with no one around him. Evens was able to finish the feed and give Nantucket a 4-0 lead that the Whalers would take into the final period of play. It was Evens first goal of the season after he missed the first two games with an injury.
“To get those three goals in the second period was huge for us,” Corbett said. “Cole has such a great shot and that was a great play by Billings to flip the puck off high glass to take advantage of the pinching Vineyard defenseman and set up that two on one opportunity. We kept telling these guys to take advantage of the pinching Vineyard defenseman and they did on that play.”
Nantucket found themselves in some penalty trouble in the final period, giving the Vineyard two power plays in the first five minutes of the third period. They were able to kill the first one off, but let one in with 10:18 to go in the game. Nantucket still led 4-1.
“I felt like we couldn’t buy a call in the third period,” Corbett said. “The Vineyard had a lot of high hits to the face and I thought a couple of the calls against us were a little ticky tacky but I don’t know. I think where it was a 4-0 score they weren’t looking to give us any calls unless they really had to.”
The Vineyard tried to claw their way back into it, but Nantucket was too much for them to overcome, primarily because of the Whaler’s forecheck and neutral zone trap that made it difficult for the Vineyard to execute offensive zone entries. The Vineyard did get a power play opportunity in the final minutes but did nothing with it. Nantucket went on to win the game 4-1 behind 22 saves by Griffin Starr.
“Griffin played really well for us and made the stops we needed him to make,” Corbett said. “He has been good for us in every game so far. If we get that kind of goaltending out of Griffin all year, we could have a very special year.”
The Whalers have now won two in a row after a 5-1 opening night loss to the Sandwich Blue Knights. They will have a few days to rest up before a rematch with the Blue Knights, which is scheduled for Thursday, December 23, at 5:15 p.m. at Nantucket Ice.
“This is going to be a big challenge for us on Thursday and we are really going to have to rise to the challenge,” Corbett said. “We are going to have to keep it a 1-0 or 2-1 style type of game I feel like in order to win. We are looking forward to going against one of the best teams in Division 4 to see where we are at.”
