St. Andrew’s College Crowned PHC Champions
Story Appeared on www.sacsaints.ca Feb 25th
Culver, IN
The six members of the Prep Hockey Conference (PHC) descended upon Culver Academies in Indiana for the fourth PHC playoffs. After a tight and competitive regular season, the Saints felt optimistic about their chances to make some noise in the final tournament to claim their first league championship. It wouldn’t be easy playing three, fast, physical and tight games over three days, but this team has proven that when completely focused they can beat anyone.
Game 1 (1/4 Final)
SAC 7 South Kent School 4
This game got off to a dream start with Michael Dec opening the scoring with an innoxious shot from the corner that caught the Cardinals goalie off guard. Luke Sinclair added to the lead a couple minutes later to give the Saints the early 2-0 lead. South Kent answered late in the period on the power-play to have the first end 2-1.
Three consecutive goals in the first seven minutes of the second period pushed the Saints lead to 5-1 and they were cruising. Bryson Morgan’s goal at 13:47 of the 2nd period would stand as the game winning goal. To their credit, South Kent kept coming and scored two goals to cut the game to 5-3 with a period to go.
The Saints put on a clinic in the third, limiting chances and playing a disciplined and structured game which would become a theme of the weekend. Alex Carscadden scored with ten minutes to go to push the game to 6-3 and ease the tension a little. Jaxon Cover added a seventh with a couple minutes to go and Saints were afforded the opportunity to breath. South Kent got one final goal to make the final 7-4 SAC and a birth in the Semi-Final.
Luke Sinclair was the catalyst on the day chipping in two goals and assist to pace the offense and was awarded player of the game by his teammates.
Boxscore
Game 2 (1/2 Final)
SAC 4 Shattuck St. Mary’s 3
On Saturday, the PHC Semi-Final pitted the #1 USA Ranked and first place PHC team, Shattuck St. Mary’s Sabres against the #1 Ranked Canadian Team St. Andrew’s College Saints for a birth in the league final.
The game got off to a tentative start for the Saints as Shattuck fired 21 shots in the opening period. Always they play the game with pace and intensity and the Saints managed the early storm through some solid goaltending from Paolo Frasca. The Sabres finally broke through with a miscue below the goal line leading to a chance in tight and a goal eight minutes into the game. Shattuck added a second off a turnover and the Saints were left wondering if this would be their day. Almost immediately, after some amazing forechecking from Nolan Long and a nifty pass to linemate Jacob Bultje for momentum shifted with a Saints goal and some hope restored.
The second showed a more confident and attentive Saints team and Michael Dec knotted the score at 2-2 with a beautiful individual effort and shot from distance that fooled the Sabres goalie. The teams frustrated each other for the remainder of the period as neither team wanted to give an inch.
The third period couldn’t have started any better as “Mr. Clutch” Alex Carscadden buried a rebound from in tight to give the Saints the early goal they needed and a 3-2 lead. From there it was a clinic in sacrifice and attention to detail as the boys in red disrupted and thwarted each attack from Shattuck St. Mary’s. Michael Dec iced the game with the Sabres net empty with under a minute to play. A late extra-attacker goal from the Sabres didn’t let the Saints start celebrating until the final buzzer and 4-3 win to clinch a birth in the Championship Final against either Northwood School or Culver Academies.
Boxscore
Championship Final
SAC 5 Northwood School 1
Sunday was SAC’s first chance to get back to the final after a heartbreaking loss in overtime to Shattuck St. Mary’s in the league first season in 2021-22. Northwood was in their second consecutive final after falling 2-1 to Shattuck St. Mary’s last season.
Northwood came out firing in the first and Saints had to weather wave after wave of pressure from the motivated Huskies team. SAC Goaltender, Paolo Frasca was up to the task handling his net front with confidence and poise to give this teammates confidence. Even though the Saints were on the wrong end of the momentum for most of the period and a couple well executed counter attacks and rushes resulted in PHC leading scorer Michael Dec giving the Saints a 2-1 lead from two goals and beautiful feeds from Kieren Dervin, heading into the first intermission break.
To start the second, the Saints found a new wind as they played a diligent and focused game creating offense and stifling the Huskies attack at every turn. It was a battle of attrition with Saints holding the advantage moving into the third 2-1 with 20 minutes to play.
Starting the third on penalty kill, the Saints got a game changing save from senior Paolo Frasca to keep the score 2-1 early in the frame. Shortly following the successful penalty kill, captain Aidan Lane was able to create some space for himself and rip a shot off the rush to the far corner and give us some breathing room with 18:39 left to in the final period. The Saints continued to play a stifling, puck management style of game from the entire defense corps led by seniors Oliver Turner, Sebastian Dell’Elce and Austin Gao. Their effort and determination to protect our lead was energizing and palpable. The Saints were rewarded for their efforts after a great forecheck by Nolan Long to create a turnover, and Lucas Prud’homme put the game away with a well-placed shot from in tight. Prud’homme added another into the empty net to give the Saints a 5-1 lead and the school’s first Prep Hockey Conference Championship.
Paolo Frasca was named player of the game by his teammates for consistently providing calm and timely saves. Overall, it was a complete team effort to commit to both sides of the puck and help the Saints capture their first Prep Hockey Conference Champioship!
