After suffering two straight losses, the Londonderry High ice hockey team reversed its fortunes with a solid defeat of its arch rival last weekend.
The LHS icemen saw their Division I record slide to the .500 mark with a one-goal loss to Nashua North during the middle of last week. But coach Peter Bedford and his Lancers then reversed their course with a superb effort against the Pinkerton Academy Astros last Saturday.
After starting their 2014-15 Division I season with two straight wins, the Lancer icemen suffered their second consecutive loss at the Salem Icenter Wednesday, Jan. 7, with a 4-3 defeat at the hands of the surging Nashua North Titans.
North, which had begun its D-I campaign with two consecutive losses, bagged its third straight divisional win that night.
Londonderry drove its record up to 3-2 Saturday afternoon, Jan. 10, at the Icenter with a fine 4-2, Ball Family Trophy defeat of the arch-rival Pinkerton squad, following which Bedford was one happy man.
“I was very pleased. This was the best game we’ve played so far,” said the coach. “They’re really starting to listen, we’re finding some maturity, and I think the lines have solidified at this point.”
The now 2-2-1 Astros started the scoring with 6:39 left in the first period when Ethan Landry was set up by teammates Ryan Monte and Tim Cronin.
But the Lancers potted the equalizer 3:01 later when Andrew Morrissette was set up by Mike MacKenzie and Nick Donnelly, and 1-1 was where the score sat when the first period finished.
Bedford’s bunch then scored the first of its three power-play goals – and the only goal of the second period – with 8:58 left in the middle stanza when Ryan Cotter was set up by Alex LaPlante. And 2-1 was where the score was going into the final 15 minutes of action.
The Lancers then bumped their lead up to 3-1 on another man-up marker with 7:30 left in the contest when Pat Maloney was set up by Cooper Roy.
Pinkerton got that marker back with a mere 3:50 left when Tyler Poole scored a power-play tally, but Londonderry got the last word where scoring was concerned when Maloney potted his second man-up marker – this time on a set-up from Colby Austin – with just 51 seconds showing on the game clock.
Lancer goalie Cody Baldwin contributed 21 saves to the performance, while Pinkerton goalie Brendan Murphy turned aside 25 Londonderry blasts in the losing effort.