The CIAC boys hockey tournament reaches its halfway mark Saturday as Division I completes the state quarterfinal round. There are a couple of early quarterfinals and two later on in Stamford.
After Saturday, the scene moves to Hamden. Semifinals are Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, all at Quinnipiac’s M&T Bank Arena. The finals are there as well, Thursday in Division III and the following Monday and Tuesday, March 18-19, in the top two divisions.
Here’s what you need to know from Day 6. (This post has been updated with the two later games.)
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Green wave
Notre Dame-West Haven’s CIAC playoff debut finished a lot like its SCC/SWC playoff finale. The second-seeded Green Knights beat seventh-seeded Xavier 3-0 at Sacred Heart’s Martire Family Arena on yet another Layne Jackson shutout. James Mascari scored twice and assisted on Mickey Dowd’s goal in the second period.
Jackson shut out Fairfield Prep in the conference final, and Notre Dame won that by the same score.
The Green Knights, ranked atop the GameTimeCT Top 10 Poll since the beginning of January, are 12-0 against state competition, 17-4-2 in all.
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This is the fourth consecutive completed tournament — 2019, 2022, 2023 and now 2024 — in which Notre Dame has reached the semifinals. The Knights reached the final in the previous three and won in 2022.
Their opponent in Wednesday's semifinals, time to be announced, will be Simsbury.
Get back
Simsbury held on for a 3-2 win over Northwest Catholic at Trinity College. Reid Anastasio scored twice for the Trojans.
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Third-seeded, fourth-ranked Simsbury twice led by two only to see the sixth-seeded, seventh-ranked Lions cut their lead in half. But the Trojans earned their first CIAC tournament win since 2013, ending the longest active drought in the state. (That now falls to East Catholic and Milford, who have been waiting since 2014.)
Simsbury defeated Northwest Catholic four times this season, twice by one goal and twice by two, including the CCC North championship game last week.
Simsbury last played in a semifinal in its championship year of 2003, when it became only the second school north of Cheshire to win the Division I title (Enfield, 1983).
We’ll meet again
The late quarterfinals at Terry Conners Rink were a complete rematch of the FCIAC semifinals. One of those results got flipped.
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Charlie Schwind scored twice, both of them giving Darien a lead, as the Blue Wave avenged their conference-playoff loss to Ridgefield with a 3-1 victory over the Tigers. Jack Marisca added a goal in the third period.
Senior goalie Quinn Kreppein made key saves for Darien and held Ridgefield to a Ryan McNicholas power-play goal in the second period.
New Canaan defeated Greenwich once again, this time 7-0. Six different Rams scored goals (Max Lowe scored the extra), and Mason Pickering earned the shutout.
The Rams and Blue Wave met twice in the regular season and split those games; each won 4-3 in overtime.
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Xavier 0 0 0—0 Notre Dame-West Haven 1 2 0—3 First period: 1, ND, James Mascari (Logan Hurd), 13:35. Second period: 2, ND, Mascari (Dominic Dowd), 1:39. 3, ND, Dowd (Mascari), 11:34. Goalies: X—Ryan Galaski (26 saves); ND—Layne Jackson (12). Shots: X 12, ND 29. Records: X 8-14-1; ND 17-4-2.
March 9, 2024
Michael Fornabaio is a sports reporter with Hearst Connecticut Media Group. Born in the Bronx and raised at the New Haven Coliseum (but really in Orange), Fornabaio has been with the Connecticut Post since 1997. He has covered high school sports for pretty much that whole time, though he also covered the AHL's Bridgeport Sound Tigers daily for 17 years. In his occasional free time, you can usually find him watching more baseball or hockey and complaining about the delay-of-game rule.