By Warren Kozireski —
Jack McCandless scored a first period natural hat trick as Victor defeated Division I defending champion Syracuse 4-0 to advance to the state semi-finals Sat. March 14 against Williamsville North, who defeated Ithaca in their regional.
McCandless began the scoring at 9:13 of the first period on the power play as he banged home the second rebound after shots by Andrew Haugh and Cal Lambert.
He scored again 50 seconds later on a wrister stick side following a pass from Nick Peluso.
The four-year varsity player and co-captain completed his natural hat trick beating the first period horn sitting on the back door with assists from Peluso and Alex Parton.
“My teammates played really well and won battles down in the corners and the puck went in after their hard work,” McCandless said. “My teammates worked so hard to get me the puck and it’s just amazing. Just go to the net with your stick on the ice and hopefully it goes in.”
“We work so hard to get to this point and we don’t want it to end so we were working hard and results came.”
Victor padded their lead at 9:10 of the second period with an even-strength tally by Colin McNamara with assists to Sam Moore and Charlie Romeis.
The Blue Devils outshot the Cougars 24-18 as Peter Bartelse recorded his sixth career shutout and first in the postseason.
“Peter (Bartelse) played well tonight and defensively I thought we played well; did a lot of good stuff,” Victor head coach Mike Ferreri said.
“He (McCandless) is one of our captains and one of our leaders, he wants to see the team succeed and today he was rewarded for all the hard work.”
