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By Michael Flanagan
Hometown Weekly Sports
The Needham High School girls varsity hockey team appears poised to make another deep tournament run come late-February as the Rockets (9-4-2, 5-0-2) have gotten hot at the right time. In their last six contests, the Needham girls are 5-0-1 and have outscored their opposition 29-5 (15-0 in their last two games).
Elizabeth Phalen (18) and Rose Evans (21) get the better of a center-ice mosh-pit with a Framingham attacker.
In the latest chapter of this dominant recent run by Needham, the Lady-Rockets earned a convincing 8-0 win over Framingham on Wednesday night on the back of Gracie Bruno. After getting Needham on the board just 30 seconds into the game, the junior forward went on a scoring barrage and ended the night with four tallies, a career-high for most goals scored in a single game.
Sophomore Celia Blaszkowsky (4) fights of a stick check and navigates the puck around the net early in the first period. Photos by Conor McNabb
Just 2:45 after her game-opening goal, Bruno doubled Needham’s lead to two by banging home the rebound off of a shot from the point. Rose Evans extended Needham’s lead to 3-0 just minutes later before Bruno completed the first period hat trick with a little under three minutes to play, as the Rockets entered the first intermission with a commanding 4-0 advantage.
Pictured here making a cross-ice pass, junior forward Gracie Bruno (14) potted four goals on Wednesday night to help guide the Needham girls to a dominant 8-0 win over Framingham.
Bruno added a fourth tally just seconds into the second period as she made a nifty little dangle with a toe-drag around a Framingham defender and sniped the puck bar-down on the backhand, extending the Needham lead to 5-0. Freshman forward Grace Kelly later added a goal on the power play along with a tally by Elizabeth Phalen to extend the lead to 7-0 at the second intermission. Needham added another goal early in the third period and went on to win by a final of 8-0.
The Rockets will look to keep up the momentum when they travel to face Braintree on February 7 before hosting rival Natick on February 10 at Babson.
For funny and incisive sports analysis, follow Mike Flanagan on his personal Twitter at @fLAno0, or read his blog at www.flannylive.wordpress.com.
