SD Prep Sports:

2006-07 Winter Sports
Metro Conference

Roller Hockey
Kiwanis Cup Playoffs

West Hills howls with first-ever playoff win

Posted Feb. 20, 2007
The West Hills High School roller hockey team was howling with excitement following Tuesday’s history-making Kiwanis Cup championship playoff victory.

“It’s hard to express the excitement and how proud we are as coaches and as players of this team,” Wolf Pack head coach Richard Lopez said following West Hills’ 8-4 victory against Mesa League co-champion Eastlake at Skate San Diego in National City. “We’ve still got a young team. We’ve been playing well the last four games.”

Tuesday’s victory — which came in the Wolf Pack’s first-ever playoff appearance in the team’s two years of play in the CIF/Metro Conference — launched the East County squad into Wednesday’s single-elimination quarterfinal-round matchup against top-seeded Scripps Ranch (19-1-0) at the Escondido Sports Center.

Quarterfinal winners advance to Monday’s semifinals at either the Escondido Sports Center or Skate San Diego. The championship game is scheduled for Wednesday, Feb. 28 at either rink.

West Hills, seeded eighth in the 12-team playoff draw, trailed just once in the game and that was 1-0 on a goal by Eastlake’s J.K. Williams with 5:34 left in the opening period. The Wolf Pack (8-12-1) responded with unanswered goals credited to Jaron Beach and Donnie Keffer to end the period with a 2-1 lead and scored three more times to take a 5-3 edge into the final period.

West Hills, which finished in fifth place in the six-team North County League standings during regular season play, outscored the ninth-seeded Titans (14-7-0) by a 3-1 score in the third period to finish the contest strong.

All four North County League teams defeated their opponents from either the Mesa League or South Bay League in Tuesday’s playoff openers to continue to make a statement for the superior quality of play in the northern circuit.

“They’re a great team,” Wolf Pack assistant coach Rocky Delgadillo said in reference to Eastlake, which dropped a 4-3 overtime decision to West Hills in non-league play earlier this season. “We felt we could play with them. All the teams in our league are tough. We were prepared to play. The one thing about games in the North County League is that it’s intense from the first whistle to the last whistle. It’s very demanding.”

The Titans, who finished 0-2-0 in two regular season matchups against North County League opponents this season, tied the game briefly at 2-all by netting the opening goal of the second period. However, the Wolf Pack jumped back into the lead with two unanswered goals — one each by Andrew Delgadillo and Matt Gage — and matched Eastlake with another goal to end the period after the Titans had narrowed the score to 4-3.

Travis Peters gave the Wolf Pack a two-goal lead by scoring with 1:05 to play in the middle frame, assisted by Keith Gurr.

Logan Boehm made it 6-3 West Hills by scoring just 1:26 into the third period, assisted by Gage. Eastlake closed to 6-4 on a goal by Zack McElroy two minutes later but that was the last goal allowed by Wolf Pack goaltender Cameron McIntyre for the remaining 11:26 of the game. Boehm scored his second goal of the contest with 4:31 left and Andrew Delgadillo notched his second goal of the game with 1:06 to play.

Overall, the Wolf Pack received points in the playoff matchup from seven players and goals from six players.

McIntyre, who earned honors as the North County League Goaltender of the Year, was solid throughout the game while facing four Eastlake power plays.

“We led the league in penalty minutes this season and were constantly short-handed,” Richard Lopez said. “If you add it up, Cameron played something like a fourth of the season facing a four-on-three. To his credit, he held in there and played well.”

West Hills finished North County League play on an upswing with a 4-3 victory against defending Kiwanis Cup champion Westview, a 3-2 loss to second-seeded Rancho Bernardo (16-4-0) and a 5-3 win against Vista.

“We carried that momentum into the playoffs,” the elder Delgadillo said.

In other first-round pairings, fifth-seeded Poway (14-7-0) stopped 12th-seeded Bonita Vista (10-10-1) by a 5-3 score, with the final goal coming into an empty net, while sixth-seeded Westview (10-10-1) rolled past 11th-seeded La Jolla (10-10-1) by a 17-3 count and seventh-seeded Vista (8-12-1) used a late spurt to edge 10th-seeded Hilltop (10-10-1) by a 9-6 score.

Notepad
•Scripps Ranch won the North County League title with a 14-1-0 league mark. The Falcons’ only loss was to Poway, the league champion the previous two seasons.

•Eastlake and fourth-seeded Otay Ranch (13-6-1) tied for the Mesa League title while third-seeded Mar Vista (17-2-1) repeated as South Bay League champions.

•Mar Vista’s Ian Nicklen won his second consecutive conference scoring title with 118 points on 74 goals and 44 assists to edge La Jolla’s Johnny Noris (114 points on 57 goals and 57 assists).

CIF/Metro Conference Kiwanis Cup Championship Playoffs
First Round/ Monday, Feb. 20 at Skate San Diego

Westview 17, La Jolla 3
Eric Obinger scored five goals and dished out nine assists as the defending Kiwanis Cup champion Wolverines dismantled the high-scoring Vikings, who were limited to single goals in each period. Leo Scheiler contributed three goals and two assists while Shane Clements had three goals and Phil Sansone scored twice. Westview rolled to a 5-1 first period edge and led 10-2 entering the final period after out-scoring La Jolla by an identical 5-1 margin in the second period. The Wolverines finished the contest with a 7-1 scoring edge in the third stanza. Viking scoring leaders Johnny Noris and Nick Whaley each picked up a goal and assist.

Poway 5, Bonita Vista 3
The Titans received a defensive challenge from a short-handed Bonita Vista team in one of the tightest first-round matchups. The Barons opened the game playing without a goaltender but applied constant pressure inside the Poway defensive zone. Once BV standout Cody Mazzarella had a chance to put on his gear and take his position between the pipes, the game opened up more for the Titans but they still found it nearly impossible to slip the puck past Mazzarella. Poway finally found a chink in the Baron goaltender’s armor with 1:39 left in the first period to go up 1-0 on a goal by Zach Vachris. But the spunky Barons tied the game, 1-1, on a goal by Blake Tanner with 2:11 elapsed in the second period. The Titans went up 2-1 on a goal by Stephen Lockwood with 10:01 to play in the second period but Bonita Vista once again evened the contest at 2-2 when female standout Kelly Nash scored an unassisted goal just 40 seconds later.

Mazzarella and the BV defense continued to hold firm until Eric Eyler broke the deadlock on the scoreboard with 4:55 left in the period. Poway held on its slim 3-2 edge for the majority of the final period, with Mazzarella deflecting a bevy of shots and the Barons sneaking down court for an occasional high-percentage scoring opportunity. The Titans got a huge goal to go up, 4-2, when Eric Eyler tallied with just 4:54 to play. However, Bonita Vista never gave in, and Nash closed the score to 4-3 on a goal with 51 seconds left in the game. Would the Barons stage a miraculous comeback and possibly send the contest into overtime? Lockwood took care of that for Poway with an empty net goal with 29 seconds to play.

Vista 9, Hilltop 6
The first-round matchup between the Panthers from the North County League and the Lancers from the South Bay League featured 13 penalties between the teams and almost as many momentum shifts. The first period ended tied 3-3 and a late comeback attempt by Hilltop narrowed the Vista lead to 8-6 midway through the final period. Jared Johnson keyed the Panthers with three goals while Ruben Benavides responded with a hat trick for the Lancers, who also received goals from Cory Garvin, Kekoa Latimore and Kevin Mark. Johnson and Devin Holcomb scored what turned out to be all-important third-period goals for Vista.

CIF/Metro Conference Quarterfinals
Tuesday, Feb. 21/Skate San Diego

Poway 7, Otay Ranch 2
Stephen Lockwood had two goals and two assists to lead a buzzsaw showing against the Mesa League co-champion Mustangs. The fifth-seeded Titans opened up a 5-0 lead before Otay Ranch began to finally get untracked. By then, it was too late to mount any type of sustained comeback. Zach Johnson put the Mustangs on the board with 1:01 left in the second period and Matt Nafarette added a goal 1:30 into the third period. However, Poway quickly countered Johnson’s goal with a goal by Zach Vachris just 54 seconds into the next period. Nafarette’s goal made it 6-2 Titans. Poway rolled out to an impressive 3-0 first quarter lead by playing the whole court in a wide-open offensive style that seems to best suit this season’s team. Adam Gould had two goals while Eric Eyler and Zachris each were credited with single goals.

Westview 10, Mar Vista 5
The third-seeded Mariners owned a 4-1 lead with less than three minutes remaining to be played in the second period and seemed to be in control of the game until the wheels seemed to come off the skates of the reigning South Bay League champions. The defending Kiwanis Cup champion Wolverines, despite fielding a significantly less experienced lineup this season, proved they still had some fight left in them by engineering one of the most prodigious comebacks in the history of the tournament. Westview scored twice to end the second period trailing 5-3 and then rolled all over the Mariners with seven unanswered goals in the final period to win in a rout. You had to see the game to believe the outcome.

Wolverines coach Gordon Wiens attributed his team’s inspired turnaround to a time-out called after Mar Vista went ahead 4-1 on the third goal of the game by CIF/Metro Conference scoring champion Ian Nicklen. The pause seemed to settle the young Westview team — and the high scoring Mariners were kept at bay for the stretch of 11:14 that remained in the middle period and all 15 minutes of the final period — a span of 26:14.

Meanwhile, Westview engineered its comeback against one of the top goaltenders in the conference in the guise of the Mariners’ Mike Gisi. The Wolverines roared into the third peiod with two goals in the opening five minutes of play to deadlock the game at 5-5. Goals 1:08 apart by Drew Ness and Jon Cohen midway through the frame pushed Westview ahead 7-5. The fashion in which Westview’s seventh goal was scored may have provided the final momentum shift in the contest. With the Wolverines being whistled for a delayed penalty while nursing a 6-5 lead, Mar Vista controlled possession of the puck with the opportunity to tie the game. Instead, a Mariner forward passed the puck back toward the center of the floor and it hit a wrinkle in the surface, changed direction and rolled into the vacant net after Gisi had skated over to the team’s bench in favor of an extra attacker.

The teams skated scoreless for the next four minutes but Mar Vista could not get anything past the Wolverines netminder. Westview then scored three final goals on counter-attacks. Cohen made it 8-5 with 2:50 to play. Shane Clements upped the score to 9-5 with 1:48 to play. Jason Kurth was credited with the final Wolverines tally with three seconds left.

The game ended in frustration for the Mariners, who had looked to do serious damage in this year’s playoffs. Instead, the second-half collapse will be remembered as a worst nightmare.

Simply unbelievable — on both sides of the floor.

Broncos skate to Kiwanis Cup championship
Poway Titans finish runner-up in CIF/Metro Conference title game for third consecutive season

For the third consecutive year the Poway Titans found themselves playing in the Kiwanis Cup championship game. For the third consecutive year, they finished second to a different challenger. First, it was Scripps Ranch, the fifth-seeded Titans Feb. 28 at the Escondido Sports Center.

Rancho Bernardo (19-4) received points from just four players in the contest that saw the Broncos buck out to a 4-0 first-period advantage and later extend that edge to 5-0 before Poway (16-8) finally answered the challenge with a pair of goals in the latter half of the second period.

Tanner Woodbury gave RB a 1-0 lead just 2:55 into the game and Matt Kresky followed with the first of his two goals in the game with another unassisted tally just 45 seconds later to double the Broncos’ advantage to 2-0.

Kresky increased the lead to 3-0, assisted by Kory Grahl, after a stretch of nearly six minutes without a goal, and then it was Grahl’s turn to get into the scoring column, assisted by Corbin Walters, with 4:26 left in the period.

Both RB goals came in rapid-fire fashion. The opening two goals were separated by 45 seconds. The Broncos’ closing two goals in the period came 59 seconds apart.

Grahl got the all-important jump goal in the second period, assisted by Woodbury with 9:39 left in the period.

The Titans, who had eliminated top-seeded Scripps Ranch by a 5-4 overtime score in the semifinals two days earlier, got on the scoreboard courtesy of goals by Stephen Lockwood and Danny Barnes but could not bring the score closer than 5-2 in Rancho Bernardo’s favor by the end of the period.

Poway scored once more in the game, this time getting the first goal of the third period to narrow the contest to two goals at 5-3 as Elliot Gormican, assisted by Zach Porter, scored just 33 seconds into the frame.

But the Broncos defense thwarted the Titans’ best scoring chances thereafter and RB scored the championship-clinching goal with 9:37 to play as Grahl completed his hat trick.

Grahl finished the game with three goals and one assist while Kresky had two goals and Woodbury had one goal and two assists.