New Hampton Too Strong For Vermont Academy

The New Hampton Huskies take the ice tonight against a familiar foe, in Vermont Academy. Last year, the Huskies suffered a tough loss in the Lakes Region Semi-Finals to Vermont Academy and will be looking to seek revenge tonight. The start of games recently has not been going well for New Hampton and tonight was no different. Vermont Academy took advantage of a bad turnover by the Huskies, scoring forty seconds into the game. New Hampton did not let the early affect them, scoring five minutes later to tie the game at one. Marcus Joughin scored on an attempted pass that hit a Vermont defender and deflected into the net. Joughin’s goal was assisted by Isaac MacLeod. In the next two minutes, the Huskies pressure caused Vermont Academy to take two penalties, putting New Hampton on a 5-on-3 power play. Cale DuBrul gave the Huskies the lead, ripping a shot from the point about knee high that beat the Vermont Academy goaltender right over his pad and under his blocker. Adam Shuchart and Jake Dunlap assisted on the play. The Huskies dominated the rest of the period, except for one moment where they fell asleep, allowing Vermont to tie the game before the end of the period. New Hampton came out flat to start the second period and Vermont Academy took advantage, scoring just over a minute in to take a 3-2 lead. Vermont Academy’s goal seemed to wake up the Huskies, they scored three times in the next ten minutes to take a 5-3 lead after two periods of play. New Hampton’s third goals was scored by Duke Litwin. Parker Schaarschmidt hit Davis Bone with a break out pass, who fed the puck to Litwin in the neutral zone. Litwin caught the pass and flew down the left side of the ice, beating a defender before ripping a shot high to the glove side. The fourth Husky goals was scored by Alec Grace. Jack Ring started Grace’s goal off, when he found Adam Shuchart at the point with a pass. Shuchart fired a nice hard shot on net that the Vermont Academy goaltender could not handle. Grace was in perfect position in front of the net to slam home the rebound. Cory Morris scored New Hampton’s fifth goal, on the power play. Morris doing his job in front of the net, screening the Vermont Academy goaltender. While screening, Morris was able to get a stick on Jake Dunlap’s point shot, deflecting the puck in the back of the net. The start of the third period saw back and forth action, with the Huskies playing solid defense, looking to maintain their 5-3 lead. With three minutes left in the game, James Hatzepetros added to New Hampton’s lead, once again on the power play. Hatzepetros, snuck in from the point and Marcus Joughin thread a beautiful pass through the seam to give Hatzepetros a backdoor empty net tap-in goal. Vermont Academy tried to come back, pulling their goalie and playing with an extra attacker the rest of the game, but the Huskies held tight and won the game 6-4. New Hampton picked up some valuable Lakes Region regular season points with the win. The Huskies will look add to those Lakes Region regular season points tomorrow when they host Brewster Academy.