On January 12th, the Crown Point Bulldog Varsity team faced the Carmel Gold’s Ice Hounds. The team played fiercely while trying to achieve their ultimate goal: to win. With overcoming the previous week’s loss, the Bulldogs paved their way to an excellent win with the final score being 2-1.  Each one of the players were team-oriented, which helped them maintain a consistent and engaging game. 

The game was action packed and had many twists and turns both literally and figuratively. In the first quarter, the team prided themselves on executing on-point defense. They made sure that when the other team got close to their goal, they took the puck back and gained control. Within the first few minutes of the first quarter, the first goal was scored by senior, Phil Summers (5). The team hustled the last few minutes of the 1st quarter to try and get the perfect setup to score again. Because of the continuation of solid team play, freshman Louie Rodawold (23) scored the next point within minutes of the last goal.

The third quarter is when the game gets tense. The team was determined to stop anything the other team tried to throw at them. They almost succeeded until the other team scored. With a lot of wraparounds and races to get the puck away, the Bulldogs maintained their drive. The game clock read one 1:10 seconds remaining in the game. The other team was close to scoring until the goalie managed to catch the puck mid-air. The Ice Hounds were a tough team to beat, but the Bulldogs came to win. 

Upon speaking to Head Coach Bryan Philbin, who has been coaching for eight years and four of those years as the head CP varsity coach. He commented on how this team has improved and how he uses his players’ strengths and weaknesses to an advantage for each game plan.

 “Without a doubt, we have improved throughout the whole year, each game we seem to find something to work on and something to get better at. We’ve gotten stronger, quicker, faster, and we are handling the puck better,” Philbin said. “Believe it or not, in hockey there is a lot of critical thinking involved. It’s almost like playing chess. You have to recognize where a kid excels in one area versus another area and match up against the other team to give your team the best opportunity to win. There is no other game like hockey that involves a full group effort as a team.” 

Before the hockey game junior, Collin Nelson (29) does this to help him get into the right mind space. “Usually I kind of just sit and listen to my own thoughts. I prepare and kind of visualize before the game,” Nelson said. “It has probably been the best two years of my life and the next few years are going to be fun as well. It is a really fun time, I’ve made a lot of good buddies and it’s like a family.”

When doing a post-game interview with junior, Liam Yadron (55) and sophomore, Jake Bishop (83) they said that staying aggressive is key to succeeding in this game. Yadron said that he thought that the team did a “better job at staying aggressive and keeping the floor.” One of the biggest struggles he faced was a lot of penalties and he has to work on that. When speaking with Bishop, he thinks that the team needs to work on “staying aggressive the whole entire game” because they kind of “fell flat-footed” in the second period.

Team Captain senior, Anthony Teodori (91) says this about how he feels about the support of the people in Crown Point. “It’s nice playing in front of the entire town and most of our school, everyone comes out. It’s  nice to have support,” Teodori also states this about being on the team, “It is an honor to be team captain but it is also a lot of responsibility. I have to make tough speeches in the locker room when we go through losses but today, it was a good speech. This one matters and it’s great to lead the team. It is just a really fun thing to do. I love it.”

To get more information about game times, roster and schedules for the Varsity and JV Hockey team visit this website: https://cpbulldogs.net/