Winter Sports

Hockey Notebook: Souhegan girls hockey off to a strong start

The Souhegan High School girls hockey team is opening eyes. While the attention has been on Hanover, Exeter and Bishop Brady-Trinity-West dominating the girls hockey scene in the state, the Sabers have snuck up with a 5-1 start of their own. A 7-0 win over Bedford on Saturday was the norm for a team

The Souhegan High School girls hockey team is opening eyes.

While the attention has been on Hanover, Exeter and Bishop Brady-Trinity-West dominating the girls hockey scene in the state, the Sabers have snuck up with a 5-1 start of their own.

A 7-0 win over Bedford on Saturday was the norm for a team that has averaged more than five goals per game. But, it was the opportunity for the squad to keep gaining experience.

“It was a nice chance to get all of our skaters in,” said coach Kelli Braley. “I saw how our top couple of lines played off of distributing the puck.”

It wasn’t as easy as it may have looked on paper on Saturday for the Sabers. Center Shannon Paquette moved to defense after the team learned they would be missing a blueliner against Bedford.

“We were short a defender, so Shannon had to go play defense," Braley said. "That mixes up our game a little bit, and we had one practice to focus on that. She’s a solid hockey player, so she can go anywhere on the ice.”

It didn’t affect the offense without Paquette there, still netting seven goals against the Bulldogs, but it meant they had to get a bit creative. It was much tighter early on, 1-0, until the team exploded in the second period.

“That kind of move weakened us up front a little bit,” said Braley. “But we did a nice job and got our legs under us. Once we did, we were good to go and it opened up in the second.”

The Sabers haven’t lost too much this season, with five seniors gone, but the core of the group remains. That extra time together has made them click all the more, and given them opportunities teams with more roster changes may not have.

“The core of our team returned from last year,” said Braley. “We graduated a couple of seniors, but they were impact players and it was tough without them at first. It didn’t take us long to be able to install the same system for the season for the girls still here. They had already gelled.

“A few play club together in the offseason. It’s been nice to have them click early.”

The Sabers will have to face some more tough teams later this season, such as Berlin-Gorham twice and Brady-Trinity-West later on. But, the Sabers are spending the early season coming together as a team, and they could be dangerous.

Players of the Week

Chris Boucher, Monadnock: The Huskies’ forward tallied three times in a 6-1 victory over Inter-Lakes-Moultonborough.
Alex Nangle, Kearsarge-Plymouth: Nangle’s hat trick powered his team to a 6-4 win against Hollis Brookline-Derryfield.
Spencer Burgess, Concord: A 26-save effort from Burgess helped lead Concord to a 4-3 win over Trinity.
Sydney Herrington, Brady-Trinity-West: In a dominant 11-0 win over Bedford, Herrington scored six times herself. She also added four assists.