Forest Hills N/E 4 Portage Central 1

The WMHSH Blog is very proud to present this write up and the accompanying pictures, which come to us courtesy of two great hockey fans. The story was written by my regular Kalamazoo-area blogger, Bob Wheelright, whose son plays for Portage Northern. Bob has been a stalwart, attending a ton of games played in Kalamazoo by all the teams in the SWMHSHL and blogging them for me.

The pictures tonight come courtesy of 12-year old Connor Sullivan, whose dad sent them into me. Connor has great journalistic instincts. You'll notice a picture of FHNE player Jeff Johnston trying out a stick. Turns out Johnston went into the pro shop between the first and second periods to get a new stick, which he promptly used to score the game-winning goal early in the second. Thanks to both Bob and Connor for their contributions.

A very dominating performance this evening at the Georgetown Ice Arena as Forest Hills N/E defeated the Mustangs from Portage Central 4-1. Andrew Rennaker earned the #1 star for the Huskies by contributing 2 goals and creating many other good scoring chances. His first goal was the result of great anticipation of an outlet attempt by the Mustangs. Rennaker intercepted the puck and then made a very nice move around a PC defender before ripping a wrister upper right corner. The score at the end of the first period was 1-0 and the shots on goal were 9-1 in favor of the Huskies.

The second period continued what was started in period #1. The Huskies came out flying and netted their second goal less than two minutes into the period. Jeff Johnston's slapper from a Luke Swardenski (#2 star) pass made the score 2-0. Less than two minutes later, Swardenski ripped a slapper of his own into the upper left corner and the Huskies were ahead 3-0. Max Rennaker and Sam Swardenski earned the assists. Portage Central scored their lone goal of the game with 6.2 seconds remaing in the second when Chris Sandmeyer (#3 star) smoked a slap shot past Huskies netminder Sean Winks. Cody VanderVeen earned the assist. Sandmeyer missed several minutes of the second period after sustaining a knee injury, but was able to come back and finish the game on a very sore leg.

Andrew Rennaker finished the scoring at 6:12 of the third period and the Huskies cruised into the MHSAA Semi Finals.