Lady Bulldogs upend St. Mary’s

For several seasons now, the Winthrop/Lynn/Saugus girls hockey team has held up neighboring power St. Mary?s as the model of the type of program it hoped to become. The Lady Bulldogs realized that goal Saturday night at Winthrop’s Larsen Rink with a 3-2 win in which they played with greater intensity throughout.The milestone win was the 50th for coach Anthony Martucci since taking over the program. The ?Dogs ran their record to 8-2-1 (6-0-0 GEMIHL Northeast) and their commitment to team defense was evident in front of seventh-grade goaltender Brittany McPherson (26 saves),especially in the final minute when senior captain Mackenzie Clark and others were selling out to block shots during a closing Spartans? flurry.?We played really, really well. We had to play a perfect game to beat them and came about as close to that as we possibly could,” said Martucci. “We?ve been working a lot this year on cementing down the defense in our own end in order to protect our young goalies and our four defensemen (Kat Salvetti, Julianna Kennedy, Vanessa Vanbuskirk, Kasey Harris) have done so well limiting the other team?s chances.”And I thought our first line got the better of the match-ups tonight. There are some great lines in this division at Hingham, Acton-Boxboro and obviously St. Mary?s but we feel our group is right up there.”Winthrop-Lynn?s box-to-wire effort earned considerable praise from St. Mary?s mentor Frank Pagliuca.?They played with great intensity from the drop of the puck. They played like they were playing for a State Championship; we played like we were playing a game in January. Credit them – they deserved to win the game,” he said. “We had multiple chances to finish opportunities and we did not. Winthrop-Lynn finished theirs. We came out a little flat for the second game in a row and need to fix our lack of intensity at the start of games.”Winthrop gave an immediate indication of the type of night that loomed when Clarke set up Hannah Lopresti for a quick finish past Spartans? goalie Lauren Skinnon (18 saves) with just 1:10 off the first-period clock.Clarke?s power play strike at 8:23 of the second period, with assists from Vanbuskirk and Cordes, doubled the ?Dogs? margin to 2-0. Brittani Lanzilli, assisted by Alison Butler, countered that goal and gave St. Mary?slife heading into the third period when she scored with just 2:23 left in the third.However, Bulldog freshman Caroline McKinnon (from Harris) pushed the margin back to 3-1 with 11:01 to play. St. Mary?s lone answer came from Lanzilli on the power play with 7:36 to play accounting for the final as McPherson stood up to St. Mary?s furious final assault. Pagliuca cited the solid play of defenseman Madison Molea, who logged significant time due to an injury on the Spartans? back line.Both teams have league games with title implications on Wednesday. Winthrop can wrap up the GEMIHL Northeast crown with a win against Beverly while St. Mary?s (10-3-0, 3-0-0) faces undefeated Catholic Central League co-leader Arlington Catholic (13-0-1, 3-0-0) at Ed Burns Arena for the first of two games in an eight-day span.