Rye High’s boys hockey team dropped a close, exciting game at Rye Country Day on Tuesday, while playing without three starting forwards.

 

 

By Melanie Cane

 

Rye High’s boys hockey team dropped a close, exciting game at Rye Country Day on Tuesday, while playing without three starting forwards.

 

The 2-1 loss dropped the Garnets’ season record to 10-3-1. The Wildcats boosted their record to 8-7-1 with the non-league victory.

 

It was an extremely physical game, despite the absence of Rye’s Brendan Tripodi, who was away, and two other forwards Peter Collins and RHS’ leading scorer Mike Benincasa, who were completing suspensions for fighting in an earlier game.

 

Rye was riding high from its 5-1 win over Harrison last Friday at the Southern Norwalk Ice House.

 

The teams played evenly until sophomore forward Kyle Halloran netted a goal for the Wildcats on an assist from junior Zach Coppola with 2:20 left in the first period.

 

Neither team scored in the second period, but junior forward Griffin Tutun scored for RHS on a breakaway in the second minute of the third period to knot the score at 1.

 

Both teams continued to battle hard, and overtime seemed inevitable, but with five minutes left to play, Rye received a penalty and Coppola capitalized on the Garnets’ shortage of manpower to score the winning goal on an assist from Gabe Regan and Kyle Halloran.

 

Down 2-1, with 11 seconds left in the game, Jason Chin attempted to score for the Garnets while a Wildcat sat out a penalty, but Rye Country Day goalie Michael Mossman made a phenomenal save to preserve the win. He had 23 saves in all. Rye’s goaltender, Aidan Talgo, had 32 saves.

 

Wildcats Coach Erik Kallio said, “We knew it was going to be a tough game, but I’m so proud of my boys for fighting so hard for the win. It was and up and down game, and they gave it all they had.”

 

Coppola said, “We had a couple of mental lapses, but it’s all about focus and working as a team.”

 

Rye High Coach Jason Friesen was disappointed by the loss, questioning one of Rye’s five penalties, but said he thought his team played well.

 

The Garnets are entering a critical stretch of their hockey, facing John Jay on January 26 at SoNo and Pelham on January 31 at Hommocks. Rye Country Day was set to host Iona Prep post-deadline.