By: Justin Feil
In order for the Princeton High boys’ ice hockey team to have a big year, its young wave of talent will have to grow up pretty quickly.
Judging by the first two games of the year, the kittens are well on their way to becoming a fierce group of Little Tigers. PHS knocked off Hightstown, 4-3, Tuesday and followed it up with a 5-2 triumph against West Windsor-Plainsboro High South on Wednesday.
"The Hightstown team, they’re in the same boat as we are in terms of being young," said PHS head coach Paul Merrow, whose team is off until it faces Steinert on Monday. "It was a 4-3 game, and being the first game of the year, the first period was helter skelter. Then, we settled down in the second and third periods and played all right.
"Today’s game, we went in with some concern about South. South has a very senior lineup. They’re older than us. I thought that some of the younger guys might shy away."
It didn’t happen. Instead, it was a freshman, John Ryan, who scored two goals for the second straight game. He also added an assist. He is joined on the first line by another freshman, Peter Teifer, as they flank a senior center, Matt Leuck. Leuck’s younger brother, Shane, was the starting goaltender in both wins. None of the freshman really played like first-year players.
"It was quite surprising," Merrow said. "Today’s a big win, but the CVC’s going to have such parity, so who knows what it means? We have six games remaining in December, two out of conference and four in conference. We’d like to be .500 or better by the end of the month. It’s a pretty good start."
It was Nick Brener who scored the game-winner Tuesday with just under four minutes left in the game to break a 3-3 tie. Leuck also had a goal and an assist. Wednesday, the Little Tigers started slowly, but came on strong in the end of the first period and into the second period.
"I try to tell the kids to play the periods, play five minutes and get as many goals as you can score in five minutes and keep them off the board," Merrow said. "They (South) won the first five, it was even the middle five, and we won the last five. Then we scored the next two in a row in the second period and they scored and we got one late to make it 4-2 going into the break.
"I told them, the hardest thing in hockey is a two-goal lead. If they get that one, they’re back on your heels. We were up two goals and it was back and forth in the third period. We scored with 2:48 left for a three-goal lead."
