Williamsville East moved up to play large schools this season, and Saturday was the first test as the Flames faced Clarence. Williamsville East coach Mike Torrillo expects a battle every game this season, and Clarence coach Richard Brooks expected a close game on Saturday as well.
What neither one expected was a 5-5 tie.
“I expected from Williamsville East what I saw,” Brooks said. “They’re a good team; they’ve always been a good team. They’ve gone to the states. They have quality players that play travel hockey and have some good experience. I really thought it’d be a much lower scoring game, to be honest with you. We’ve been historically good on defense and in goal. I really didn’t expect 5-5. I thought it’d be two to one, three to two at the most.”
“Every game’s gonna be a grind; these are some good teams,” Torrillo said. “I was joking on the bench. I said, ‘Let’s make a gentlemen’s agreement and play 3-on-3 and make it fun.'”
While a tie leaves a team with a sense of disappointment and frustration — Williamsville East assistant coach Rick Ruggiero said it’s “like kissing your sister” — Brooks made the best of it.
“It’s a point,” Brooks said. “We’re competing against everyone else for a position. Obviously we didn’t gain anything on Will East, but we got a point that Ken East didn’t get the other night — they ended up losing. So it’s of some value. Obviously you’d like to play to win. And having had the lead in this game multiple times, although we did come back from being down 4-3, there’s a sense of disappointment, but there were some positives.”
The game was far from boring. Clarence took the first lead of the game just 1:16 into the first period on a goal by Randy Felber. The game stayed that way for most of the first period, but with 3.7 seconds remaining, Williamsville East’s Mike Steffan had other ideas as he scored to tie the game at one.
The second period picked up right where the first left off. The Red Devils scored 47 seconds into the period and again 12 seconds later to regain the lead and add to it. Cam Lock and and Nick Amodio were the goal scorers this time.
But the Flames weren’t out of it yet, of course. Joe Mostowy scored his first power play goal of the game at 1:51, and goals by Matt Cohen — shorthanded — and Jack Kelly late in the period gave East a 4-3 lead. But of course, Clarence’s Michael Faso tied the game 33 seconds after Kelly scored, and the second period ended in a 4-4 tie.
The Red Devils took the lead again 4:17 into the third thanks to Nick Lunetta, and Mostowy’s second power play goal of the game tied everything up at 5 with 2:36 remaining in the third.
“I’m happy with the way we fought back and got it with two minutes left,” Torrillo said.
“I’m glad we battled back,” said Ruggiero. “Our effort’s there. Just playing in this big boy division, you can’t take shifts off because if you take a shift off, the puck ends up in the back of our net.”
The Flames learned that the hard way on Saturday afternoon. They outshot the Red Devils 4-3 in a scoreless overtime and 32-26 overall, but each team needed just one more puck to find the back of the net — or one less of the opponent’s — and that didn’t happen.