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Sports

Amity Hockey ties Glastonbury in Overtime

Two more wins needed to qualify for state championships

Amity and Glastonbury played to a 1-1 overtime tie Wednesday night in a CIAC Division 1 hockey game at the Bennett Rink in West Haven. Amity is now 6-9-1 and needs two wins or a win and another tie in its final four games in order to qualify for the state tournament. Glastonbury has already qualified with its 11-4-1 record.
“Games like this age me,” said Spartan Coach Gary Lindgren. “This is our third overtime game of the season. I’d have obviously preferred a win, but the tie doesn’t hurt our chances to qualify for States. I’ll settle for a tie. It certainly is better than a loss.”
Amity scored its first and only goal when Joe Bianci loaded up and fired the puck at Tomahawk goalie Chris Hemhauser from the left face off circle. The shot was blocked by Hemhauser but the rebound caromed out to Will Dixon and he knocked it past Hemhauser with six minutes, 43 seconds gone in the first period.
The Spartans held that 1-0 lead until 9:39 of the third period.   Ethan Holdaway brought the puck down the right side and put it on net. Amity goalie Alec Mansfield made the initial stop but Alec Robinson, camped to the left of the net, poked home the game-tying rebound.
Neither team scored in the eight minute overtime session but Glastonbury threw everything but the kitchen sink at Mansfield. The Tomahawks outshot the Spartans 13-1 during overtime, but Mansfield just stood his ground, making one acrobatic save after another.
According to Lindgren, “Without Alec in goal, we don’t get a win tonight. He made 39 saves and stood on his head to make some of them. I shortened my bench and played only two lines in the later part of the game and in OT. I thought we had enough gas left in the tank to do it, but we were really tired. Glastonbury clearly outplayed us in overtime. We had trouble getting the puck out of our own zone.”
The Tomahawks outshot Amity 39-27 but that included their 13-1 edge during the extra eight minutes. Lindgren agreed that for the most part, it was a clean, hard fought, physical, defense-dominated contest.
He added, “I’m proud of my guys. They played their hearts out tonight. We had our chances in early in the game but so did Glastonbury. I give a lot of credit to Glastonbury. They have a good, well-coached club and two of their top players didn’t play tonight. They played harder as the game went on. I thought our defense did a nice job. Offensively, we hung in but we’re just snake bitten. We’re having a hard time finding the net.”
Amity is back in action on Friday night at 7:45 against Watertown-Pomperaug at the Taft School in Watertown.

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