It was a roller coaster of a week for the Rome Free Academy hockey team.
The team went through their highest of highs with a five goal third period to capture a 6-3 win over Cazenovia on Tuesday, before battling back in a pair of physical games amongst two tough opponents and went 0-1-1 during their annual Holiday Hockey Classic at Kennedy Arena.
Rome, which fell to Queensbury of Section II by a 5-2 margin in the first round of the tourney on Friday night, trailed 2-0 in the consolation game on Saturday afternoon against Williamsville East of Section VI, then took the lead and skated out to a 6-3 margin, before allowing three goals in the final period and played to a 6-6 tie after one overtime.
That might be considered the team’s low of the wild ride they have been on.
"We’re just beat up right now," RFA head coach Greg Cuthbertson said after the team’s meltdown in the final period.
"We are trying to mix and match some people but we just have to get healthy right now. That’s it," he added.
In the nightcap championship game, Queensbury downed Rye 4-2, to become this year’s tournament champion.
The Black Knights took a 5-3 lead into the third period and quickly sophomore forward Robbie Waller peppered in a power play goal from a feed off the stick of Matt DeMatteo and the tourney hosts appeared to be in complete control of picking up their sixth win of the season with 11 minutes remaining.
Williamsville East slowly worked the puck around and towards the middle of the ice and found the back of the net three straight times from three different skaters over the next four minutes to tie the contest. The two remained tied at 6-6 after one five minute sudden death overtime period and the Black Knights moved to 5-2-1 overall this season.
"We got up, but then we got lackadaisical and they crept back into the game," said Garrett Reilley, who was credited with three assists, including two going to his older brother, TJ.
"We made bad decisions in the defensive zone and that costs us and then we couldn’t finish after that. We just got way too comfortable," he added.
Nick Bordonaro finished with two goals and an assist, Eric Esposito had a goal and an assist and Ryan Schmeizer had an assist and the game-tying goal against Anthony D’Urso, who finished with 41 saves off 47 shots on the night.
Coach Cuthbertson also said he felt that the team had ran out of gas towards the end.
"We don’t get our legs underneath us early enough and we are not playing with any urgency early and it takes some time for them to pick it up. We’ve talked about that and something that we are working on," Cuthbertson said.
TJ Reilley, who finished his day with a three goal hat trick, scored all his goals in a four goal barrage for the Romans in the third period before he went along the boards and took a gruesome shot into the wall head first trying to put a Williamsville East player into the boards. The player ducked, and TJ Reilley went head first into the wall.
He would later leave with what was said to be believed as just a minor shake up and should see ice time in RFA’s next game, but that couldn’t be confirmed by Coach Cuthbertson after the game.
The Black Knights had already heard the unfortunate news that Nic Tardugno is likely to miss six to eight weeks with a wrist injury and if Reilley, who is their second leading scorer this season with 18 points and a team-high 10 goals, misses time it could be a make-or-break part of their season coming up.
Garrett Reilley said that he and his brother both have gone through those types of head blows before in their hockey careers and believes his brother should be fine.
"He’ll be alright. We are just being cautious about it, but we need him because he is a big part of our offense," Reilley said.
"The main thing is that we have to find somebody to replace Nic because he was a key part to our offense. Somebody will just have to step up and take his position," he added.
Several players who have been playing nicely for the Black Knights kept up their ways against Williamsville East.
Sophomore forward Mike Pekarski had three assists, junior forward Tim Philley had a goal, eighth grader Seth McCormick had an assist and the senior defenseman DeMatteo recorded a goal and an assist.
DeMatteo loved the blend of young talent that has starting to develop for the Romans, but wasn’t pleased with the outcome or the injury list starting to fill up on the team.
"It’s heartbreaking right now. It doesn’t usually happen like that," DeMatteo said.
"This weekend was horrible for injuries. I really don’t like to see my players get hurt," he said.
"These teams that we played were a little bit faster, a little bit more mature physically than the teams that we play in our section and really just gave us some experience with what is outside of the section," he added.
Coach Cuthbertson couldn’t agree more with aggressive style of play that the Black Knights saw from Queensbury and Williamsville East in their pair of tourney games.
"It was a physical tournament and we played some physical games. There were some positives to come away with in this tournament and I can say becoming more physical as a team was one of them," Cuthbertson said.
"Obviously we got punched in the mouth a little bit this weekend, but that is good because it’s going to make us a tougher team when we return to sectional play and really help us for the rest of the season," he added.
"Whether we win, loss or draw, playing the competition that we did is really going to help us down the road. That was what we wanted out of this tournament. I still believe that our best hockey is ahead of us, and we still haven’t played 40 minutes out there yet," Cuthbertson said.
