St. Mary’s boys hockey shakes off slow start to win

LYNN – The St. Mary’s hockey team didn’t have its best game on Saturday at Connery Rink against St. Peter-Marian. But what the Spartans showed was the resolve of a team with the best record in all of Division 1.After finding itself down 1-0 early in the first, St. Mary’s rallied to tie the game in the second and then scored four third-period goals to knock off the Guardians, 5-1, and run its unbeaten streak to 12 games.”I’m so proud of this team,” St. Mary’s coach Mark Lee said. “If we keep getting this type of effort, I really believe that we can be one of the teams to beat.”The Spartans (11-1-1) survived a very undisciplined second period that saw them hand St. Peter-Marian four power play chances. But a solid defense and good play from Bailey MacBurnie in net kept St. Mary’s in with a chance.”We fell into some undisciplined hockey there and took too many penalties,” Lee said.St. Mary’s trailed 1-0 despite outshooting the Guardians, 11-3, in the first period. MacBurnie’s solid play in net during the opening minutes of the second kept it a one-goal difference, giving his team a chance to get going offensively.Nikko Markham gave St. Mary’s just the medicine it needed midway through the period when he uncorked a bomb from the left point for his third goal of the season and a 1-1 tie despite both teams’ regular trips to the sin bin.The opening shift of the third proved to be the turning point as sophomore Jordan Manthorne went to the net and finished off Bobby Mullins’ feed at 51 seconds to put St. Mary’s ahead 2-1.From there, it was all downhill for the Guardians and goalie Tyler Miller, who would be under an avalanche of pressure for the final 15 minutes.The dam held for a while but Cam O’Neill provided a backbreaking goal for St. Mary’s at 6:18 when he banged home a Tim Aylward rebound to make it 3-1.Less than two minutes later, the two second-line forwards traded places as Aylward got three whacks and an O’Neill rebound, knocking it home on the third try for a 4-1 lead.”I was proud of the way we played in the third period,” Lee said. “To come back like that shows a lot of maturity.”Jarrod Fitzpatrick completed the third-period onslaught with just under a minute remaining when he niftily picked the top corner at the end of a power play for goal No. 10 of his season.