The Crested Butte News Serving the Gunnison Valley since 1999
Big third period salvages win
by Than Acuff
One thing is for sure about the Crested Butte Titans high school hockey team: They’re a third-period team. In just this past week they nearly pulled off a tremendous comeback win over the Chaparral Wolverines in the final minutes of the game and then scored three goals in the third period to take down Woodland Park 4-2.
Chaparral is one of the more disciplined, stronger teams in the state and not a team you can show up for only one period against.
“They’re typically a pretty strong program with three AAA players,” says coach Billy Watson. “We wanted to lock them up with some of our top lines.”
The Titans were treated to a surprise though when they headed to Denver for the game on Friday, December 14. While the schedule said one rink, the game was actually being played at Magness Arena, home of the Denver University Pioneers.
“That was kind of a cool surprise for the kids,” says Watson.
The cool surprise didn’t carry over to inspired play for the Titans though, as Chaparral scored four minutes into the game and then again in the final minute of the first period, outshooting Crested Butte 10-3 to go up 2-0.
“The first two periods didn’t look the greatest,” says Watson. “They almost seemed intimidated.”
Crested Butte responded early in the second period though, as Graham Barrett scored off an assist from Sam Stepanek in the second minute to breathe some life into the Titans’ legs, but Chaparral remained in control for most of the period again. Crested Butte held them off to hold the Wolverines to their one-goal lead until the third period, when Chaparral scored two goals to go up 4-1 midway through the third period.
Then, with two minutes left to play, the Titans mounted a comeback. Ted Trujillo scored and then a penalty gave Crested Butte a man advantage and Joseph Stock scored 25 seconds later to pull within one with a little over a minute left to play.
The Titans pulled their goalie, pushing for the late game-tying goal but Chaparral managed to clamp down, eventually sealing the 5-3 win with an empty net goal. Titans goalie Shaughn Rourke finished the game with 33 saves.
“It was pretty awesome to see and a close one,” says Watson. “One you wish you could have back and play with that energy in the first and second periods also. We just seemed off our game from the beginning and some sloppy penalties hurt us.”
The Titans returned home to host their first game of the season in Gunnison on Saturday, December 15 as they took the ice to face Woodland Park. Confidence was high following the spirited end to their game the night before and the fact that the Titans typically do well against Woodland Park. That confidence was soon dashed though, as a series of penalties had Crested Butte playing a man down seven minutes of the entire first period. The second line, led by the efforts of Kaden Hardesty, had the Titans pressing when they weren’t a man down but the constant penalty killing took its toll on the Titans as they gave up a rebound goal to go down 1-0 heading into the second period.
“I felt we were a much stronger team and there was more going on there than the penalties,” says Watson.
A late penalty in the first period forced the Titans to start the second period on the penalty kill once again. Fortunately, their penalty kill was solid as the pressure up ice from players like Joe Coburn, Trujillo and John Smith and the defensive work of Jack Lambert kept the Woodland Park powerplay in disarray.
Woodland Park eventually capitalized on their sixth powerplay of the game to go up 2-0 at which point the Titans finally settled down and started playing their game. Stock stripped the puck off a Woodland player as they were looking to break out and skated straight to net to score in the final two minutes of the second period and the Titans built on that in the third period after some words during the break from their coach.
“I pulled a few kids aside and talked to them and shortened up the lines,” says Watson. “I wanted our top guys playing out there and getting more reps. Once some of those kids sat a bit, they really picked it up when they were back on the ice.”
Barrett tied the game up 2-2 five minutes into the third period as he took the puck from behind the net and skated around front to stuff it in. Three minutes later Stock won the puck behind the net and played off a player in front and past the Woodland goalie for their first lead of the game and then Luke Collins scored the insurance goal with three minutes left for the 4-2 Titans win.
“The biggest thing was that we started playing as a team,” says Watson.
Watson will be focusing on the team aspect of the game with his squad this week as they prepare to host Kent Denver in Gunnison on Saturday, December 22 at 1 p.m.
“No game is going to be easy for us but I feel the only way we lose this season is when we beat ourselves,” says Watson.
