by Janet Schultz, NYHOL
The seedings are in place, the venue is ready and the teams are packing for their road trip to Canton, New York for the New York Girl’s Ice Hockey Regional Championship (it isn’t a State because not all sections have girls varsity).
With the addition of Section I East Green Wave there will be a Quarterfinal pitting East against nationally ranked (MaxPreps) #4 Skaneateles. The Lakers defeated Clinton 2-0 in the Section III Championship game. It was the first win over Clinton for Skaneateles in three years. This is East first Section I title and they took it from the Rockland Rockies.
Skaneateles has Championship game experience as they took the title in 2016-2017 and have returned to the playoffs several times since. Skaneateles also has had a winning season, losing one game and tying one game in the 11 game season.
That game will be played on Friday, Feb. 11.
Saturday is Semi-Final Day with Section X Potsdam facing off against Section VII Malone (Franklin Academy).
Potsdam beat Massena 5-3 in that Championship match-up and Malone beat Plattsburgh 2-1 in Section VII play.
The second game will pit Kenmore/Grand Island against the winner of the Quarterfinal game. Kenmore/Grand Island beat Williamsville in Section VI play. KGI has a history with the NYS Championship.
Kenmore was the first team from WNYGVIH to head to the States in 2013. It was just Kenmore in those days and they were defeated by a strong Beekmantown team in the first round. The following year they defended their title, off to States to face Potsdam in the semi-finals. This was the year that Potsdam and Skaneateles played to a 2-2 tie after four overtimes and were declared Co-Champions for 2014.
The third time is usually the charm. But for Kenmore it was a loss in the Championship game to Massenaa, after winning the semi-finals 2-1 over Alexandria Bay.
Its 2016 and once again Kenmore is the Section VI champ and heads to Albany to play Canton in the preliminary round and with a win move on to face defending champion Alexandria Bay. They lost that one 3-2
In 2017 Kenmore is now KGI, with the addition of Grand Island, and they lost the Section VI Championship to Frontier/Lakeshore/Orchard Park, who head off to the States. FLOP loses to Skaneateles but the following year they bring the first-ever NYS Championship to Western New York.
In researching it was hard to find any type of stats for girls.
Skaneateles has several players who put the puck in the net including Lizzy Sachar, a senior with 18 goals and 10 assists; Lilly Marquardt, a junior with 18 goals and 27 assists and Rebecca Cain, senior with 15 goals and 12 assists. Their goalie is Isabelle Wells who has made 184 saves on 202 shots.
Potsdam has scoring in K. Emerson with 13 goals this season followed by K. McGaheran, 8 and I. Boyd 8.
Their lone goaltender is M. Tessier, a sophomore.
Malone has two major goal scorers, but their goals have been spread across the entire team. Up front is T. Francis-Cook with 5 goals and 2 assists and A. Monette with 3 goals and 2 assists. Their lone goaltender is G. Norcross.
Kenmore’s major strength is in the goaltending of Carolyn Bourgeault. She has played over 816 minute with a .924 save percentage, 1.49 gaa and 4 shutouts. KGI also has two backups in Jordan Hofschnieder who saw 157 minute of action and has a shutout and Samantha Horne who played 72.5 minutes and had a .905 save percentage. Scoring comes from several players including Isabella Jayme with 14 goals/9 assists; Emilianna Cassillo, 8 goals/10 assists; Isabelle Bourgeault (sister to the goalie) 11 goals/6 assists and Carissa Buyea, 6 goals/ 10 assists. In League play this team is all over their opponents.
Game schedule at SUNY Canton is:
Friday, Feb. 11: Section I East vs Section III/IV Skaneateles
Saturday, Feb. 12– 6 p.m.: Section X Potsdam vs Section VI Malone
Saturday, Feb. 12– 8 p.m.: QuarterfinalWinner vs Section VI Kenmore/Grand Island
Sunday, Feb. 13–Noon: NYSPHSAA Championship.
This is an all-digital ticketed event. Cash sales will not be available at the gate.
For tickets: /gofan.co/app/school/NYSPHSAA
Masks are required at all times regardless of vaccination status.
(The stats are from MaxPreps and don’t really seem up-to-date; but it was all NYHOL could find.)
