Penncrest Wins Flyers & Pennsylvania Cups

PARADE IS SLATED FOR SAT., APR. 9

The Bishop McCort hockey team encountered a mirror image of the Crushers Saturday (Mar. 26) afternoon at HersheyPark Arena by the Penncrest Lions.Tenacious defense.Solid goaltending.Opportunistic offense.The Crushers have all of the above. So did Penncrest in the Class A Pennsylvania Cup championship. (The Lions will be honored with a parade on Sat., Apr. 9 in Media, Pa., beginning at 11 am. They captured the Flyers Cup on Mar. 23.) On this day, the Lions were one goal and an empty-netter better than the Crushers. Penncrest won the state championship 5-3 in front of an estimated 1,500 fans."They play just like we do," said McCort coach John Bradley, whose Penguin Cup championship team closed a 22-4 season. "They make it hard for you to shoot. They make it hard for you to score. They take care of their zone and work hard."Penncrest (21-1-4 in league and postseason play) overcame a two-goal deficit and used last-second tallies in the first two periods to win the school's first state title.McCort attempted to go 6-for-6 in state championship games after previously winning from 1994-97 and in 1999."They played, actually, kind of like us," McCort senior goaltender Ron Stenger said after stopping 21 of 25 shots he faced. "They played really good defense and wouldn't give us that many good opportunities. We didn't put the puck in the net as much as they did. We both had our chances, and they capitalized on theirs."The Crushers started strong with a pair of goals.Senior defenseman Cory Mock took a pass from Marc Domonkos along the right-wing boards and worked his way free in front of goalie Ryan McElhenney before using a forehand-backhand move to shove the puck through the five-hole 2:36 into the game."I took it out of the zone, and Domonkos gave me a really good pass, and I finished it off," Mock said.Sophomore forward Zac Seidel went high glove-side to score unassisted at 7:37."We've been able to play two goals down, one goal down," said Penncrest's McElhenney, who had 22 saves. "I was confident we were going to be able to score. We've been able to put the puck in the net all year. Two goals down, one goal down, it doesn't matter."The Lions' Dave Bixler tallied a pair of goals to tie the game 2-2.Bixler deflected a Rob Rottensteiner shot in with 4:32 left. Nick Kusturiss set up Bixler in the low slot, and the junior scored with only 11 seconds showing in the first.Penncrest had a potential power-play goal disallowed because of a crease violation 1:53 into the second, but the Lions added one that counted by Kusturiss a little more than 2 minutes later.Domonkos tied the score at 3 on a backhander with 6:18 remaining in the second. Kris Park took a shot that Chad James deflected to Domonkos.But Penncrest regained the advantage on another goal in the closing seconds. Brad Ryan tallied from the left circle with 12 seconds left in the second period."The first one was a slap shot from the top of the circle, a good shot. He put it right under the crossbar," Stenger said of the late-period goals. "The second one he put it through some traffic and it ended up going into the net. It hurt us, the last minute of the period and going in twice."The Lions' Kevin Vanaman clinched the win by hitting an empty net with 44 seconds remaining."They played our system," McCort junior forward Matt Cooper said. "They didn't let us take any shots. They kept us to the outside. They played excellent. We couldn't get much going."