By Avonlea Cummings
Hometown Weekly Sports Reporter
The Walpole Timberwolves traveled to the Babson College ice rink to take on their hosts the Needham Rockets for their last league match of the season. The Timberwolves put on an outstanding feat and soared past the Rockets, bringing home a 4-2 win. The Timberwolves are now 8-10-1 in their season and will be awaiting a playoff seeding.
As the face-off commenced the first period, the Walpole boys headed onto the ice with speed and agility. A daunting presence on the ice, Walpole’s defense was quick to follow Needham’s offensive skillset, silencing them of any scoring chances throughout the period. As the minutes ticked away, Walpole repeatedly took shots onto Needham’s net, and with just seven seconds left to go in the period, Timberwolves’ Owen McKenna snatched the puck away from Needham’s possession and in one fluid motion McKenna flung the puck behind Needham’s goalie giving the Timberwolves the first lead of the night 1-0 at the end of the first.
Walpole’s Jake Lania faced off with Needham’s Joe Kajunski to kickstart the second period, and the Timberwolves fed off the energy from the arena. Staying on pace with the Rockets, the Timberwolves were ready to pounce once more on Needham. Walpole’s sophomore Mike Conners slipped a pass to senior captain Mike Bisceglia, and Bisceglia plummeted another goal past Needham’s defense and into the net securing Walpole their second goal of the night. The Timberwolves weren’t done chipping at the Rockets quite yet, and in under two minutes left to go in the second period, Walpole would capitalize once again. Senior Matt Reynard swiped a pass to junior Joe Finkelstein who would dart the puck past the red goal line giving Walpole a 3-0 lead at the end of the second.
In the third period, Needham came back looking to draw blood, pushing to test Walpole’s defense, the Rockets attempted to take shots on the Timberwolves’ net. With seven minutes left to go in the third period, Needham would snag their first goal of the evening to make the score 3-1. Checking players into the boards, and battling for the puck the Timberwolves were itching to take the puck away from Needham’s lengthy possession. With just under three minutes left in the game, Needham pulled their goalie to get another man on the ice in hopes of scoring. Just under three seconds after pulling their goalie, the Rockets took advantage of their extra man and knocked the puck in once more, slimming Walpole’s lead 3-2. Seconds began to vanish from the scoreboard clock and Needham pulled their goalie for the second time of the evening. With 47 seconds left, Walpole stole the puck from the Rockets and the Timberwolves’ senior captain Nate DiMartinis swept the puck to senior co-captain Ryan Walsh. Walsh took the puck and drove it into the empty net finalizing the evening’s score 4-2 for Walpole.
Head coach Ron Dowd shared that the team has made adjustments on the ice and how their playing style has helped improve their game: “We weathered the storm a little bit, we lost a lot of close games early on in the season, like a lot of sports, hockey has a way of evening out, and we have to continue what we are doing, working on the little things… Our penalty kill, we have been attacking, we changed it up a bit, we were playing a bit passive early in the year. We have gone to a little bit more of an aggressive style which has made quite the difference,” said Dowd.
