PEABODY — The Peabody boys hockey team hasn’t exactly had the season it wanted to at this point, but Friday evening the Tanners put forth one of their best performances of the season in an 8-2 win over Nashoba Tech in a non-conference battle at McVann-O’Keefe Memorial Rink.
“We played one of our best games of the season the other night against Winthrop and we lost 4-1, but the effort was there,” said Peabody coach Christian Wright. “We brought some of that momentum into (Friday’s) game and really played well. We were able to really stick to our gameplan, move the puck and get quality opportunities.”
Andrew Phillips and Nathan LePage each had one goal and two assists to pace the offense for the Tanners, while Brandon Perry had one goal and one assist. Bryan Swaczyk, Michael Zarro, Anthony Bettencourt, Luke Buckley and Andrew Sousa each scored one goal, while Adam Aylward had one assist. Goalies Lucas DeMild (13 saves) and Tristan Ell (three saves) combined for the win in net.
“It’s great when you can get so many guys involved, and everyone played and made an impact (Friday),” Wright said.
The Tanners came out strong in the first period, pushing the pace early and drawing a penalty within the first five minutes. Although the first powerplay chance was unsuccessful, the Tanners earned another powerplay chance a few minutes later and capitalized. Phillips sent a nifty pass over to Swaczyk in the slot, and Swaczyk buried the goal to make it 1-0 Peabody.
Nashoba answered just over one minute later to tie it up and steal back some momentum, but Peabody responded with another goal, this one from Zarro, before the end of the period to take the lead — and the momentum — into the first intermission.
The second period is where the Tanners showed their dominance. Peabody outshot Nashoba 19-3 in the period, asserting its will all over the ice and scoring four goals in the process to blow the game open.
It started with Bettencourt’s goal less than five minutes into the period, then the Tanners rattled off three goals in the final five minutes of play — one each from LePage, Perry and Sousa — to take a commanding 6-1 lead into the final period.
“The first period was actually a little more shaky than I would’ve liked, but we really turned things up in the second,” said Wright. “We were able to move the puck around and really find the open guy when we needed to.”
The positive momentum rolled right into the third period for Peabody, as the Tanner notched a powerplay goal at the hands of Buckley less than three minutes in to make it 7-1. Nashoba did respond with a goal at the midway point of the period, but Phillips scored for Peabody just 30 seconds later to put the final nail in the coffin.
Next up for Peabody (6-11-1) is a road game against Medford Saturday (4) at LoConte Rink.
“We’re looking to finish the season with positive momentum over the last two games, but that doesn’t necessarily mean winning out,” said Wright. “We want to play hard over these last two games and put forth the kind of effort we’ve been giving recently. If we can keep up this level of intensity and work ethic, we’ll have a good finish to the season regardless of the results.”
