Injuries to key personnel held back North Haven High School boys’ varsity hockey in two recent contests against undefeated opponents. 

The Indians had to play their third straight undefeated SCC team last Wednesday night, one of their fiercest rivals, the East Haven Yellow Jackets. East Haven came in unbeaten in six previous games, but North Haven led from the start and looked in control for most of the way.

Indian skaters were led by senior co-captain Mike Andreucci, who scored an unassisted goal when he beat Yellow Jacket netminder Zak Bouve on his glove side for an opening period 1-0 lead. After surrendering the tying goal in the second period, North Haven answered when junior Jim Piscitelli scored an unassisted goal to put the Indians back in front, 2-1.

Piscitelli then fed Andreucci, who scored his second goal to open up a 3-1 advantage at the end of the second period for the Indians.

East Haven cut the lead to 3-2 late in the third and pulled their goalie for an extra attacker with under a minute to play. While at full strength on the ice numbers-wise, North Haven was down one of their senior co-captains and defensive leaders. “With less than five minutes to play, we lost our top defender to an injury,” said NHHS hockey head coach Tom Roche.

When a scrum ensued with 23 seconds remaining in front of the North Haven net, Indian goal tender Mike Amarone was taken down hard as the puck trickled across the line.

“Amarone had to be taken to the hospital,” said Roche. “We had to put in our freshman goalie.”

No penalty was called on the takedown of Amarone and the tying goal was allowed to stand and the teams headed for overtime.

“We were up 3-1 heading into the third, but they came back and outplayed us in the third,” Roche said.

Each team appeared cautious in the extra frame and, as time was winding down for what looked like an apparent tie, East Haven's Matt Longobardi flipped the puck over freshman goalie Andrew Graziano's shoulder from the side. It bounced and rolled backwards into the net for the game winner with 52 seconds remaining.

“I really thought that we outplayed East Haven,” Roche said. “But we made some errors and, to their credit, they capitalized on them.”

After the crushing defeat, North Haven had to play another state-ranked team, Hamden, two nights later.

“Hamden is always a tough matchup,” Roche said.

Going into the game, North Haven’s roster featured a staggering amount of hurt players unable to suit up. The Indians were without Amarone, Johnson and fellow senior co-captain Tyler DeMartin. “Having four of our top ten players out with injury, we knew this game would be a struggle,” Roche said.

The team looked inspired, however, after skating to a 1-1 first-period tie, but the depth of the Green Dragons was just too much to overcome and the Indians ultimately fell to a 6-3 defeat which dropped their overall record to 3-4. Senior Ken Broccoli scored a pair of goals and junior Karl Anderson tallied a third to pace the Indians offense. Gaziano went the distance in net for the first time this season.

“We were in there for a lot of it,” Roche said. “We played well, but Hamden outplayed us and beat us in the long run.”