Boys Hockey Scores 11 Goals In Blowout Victory Over Monomoy/Mashpee

Nothing has come easy for the Nantucket boys hockey team so far this season. They have had very few nights, if any, where a win came comfortably. But on Wednesday it was a different story when the Whalers hosted the 1-8-1 Monomoy/Mashpee Monarchs. Nantucket scored three goals in the first period and rode that early game momentum to a convincing 11-3 victory to improve their record to 5-4 this season.

Junior center Colby O’Keefe had a hat trick and five-point night while freshman forward Canton Jenkinson also had a hat trick. Head coach Jack Moran was ecstatic with his team’s performance and was thrilled to see freshman Baer O’Banion score his first career varsity goal.

“The best part about that whole game was getting those young kids in, seeing them play, seeing the look on their face,” Moran said. “When Baer scored everyone was going crazy when he got his first goal. That is really what it is all about you know what I mean? We wanted to get those guys in today to give them their first taste and see what it is going to be like.”

Two of Nantucket’s three first period goals came off the stick of O’Keefe, who now has five goals and three assists through his team’s first nine games. Jeremy Jenkinson scored the game’s first goal and continues to be a key piece to Nantucket’s offense as a freshman with five goals and nine points in as many games.

Junior center Ryan Davis had two goals, both of which were shorthanded goals during the same penalty kill early in the second period. He has been a reliable player for Moran who can be depended on in any situation. He leads the team with 13 points and is tied with Canton Jenkinson for the team-high in goals with seven.

Two minutes after Davis scored his second shorty, junior defenseman Michael Culkins scored from the point to make it a 6-2 game just 20 seconds after Monomoy had gotten on the board. After Culkins was unable to find the back of the net through his first seven games, he now has two goals in two games and is up to seven points this season.

Canton Jenkinson scored his first of the game 42 seconds after Culkins lit the lamp. O’Keefe scored his third goal as the buzzer sounded on a hard shot to make it 8-2 after two periods.

The Whalers rolled out all of their lines in the third period to rest their top guys while also giving their depth players, who work hard day after day in practice and dryland training, an opportunity to get some ice time and experience hockey at the varsity level.

After Jenkinson scored two consecutive goals to make it 10-2, O’Banion came racing down the middle of the ice and released a nice wrist shot that beat the Monarch goalie to make it 11-2, sending his teammates on the ice, on the bench, and the crowd into a frenzy.

Monomoy scored 11 seconds after O’Banion’s goal to make it 11-3. That score would stand to the end with the Whalers skating away with a victory that left every player in the throwback white uniforms feeling good as they left the rink.

“As much as it may appear with the score and everything, we had to keep playing our game,” Moran said. “We can’t let off our game because even though we may be going against a team having some difficulties, we can’t let our foot off the pedal. That is why we tried putting them in more and more and more to try to give a more balanced feel to it”

The Whalers will have some time off before they host St. John Paul II on Monday, Jan. 30 at 5 p.m. The statistics from the game on Nantucket’s end are below.

FIRST CAREER POINTS:

Baer O’Banion: 1 goal

Gordon Raimo: 1 assist

OTHER STATISTIC LEADERS:

Colby O’Keefe: 3 goals, 2 assists.

Canton Jenkinson: 3 goals.

Ryan Davis: 2 goals, 1 assist.

Michael Culkins: 1 goal, 2 assists.

Jeremy Jenkinson: 1 goal, 2 assists.

Soren Edwardes: 4 assists.

Jack Billings: 3 assists.

Curren Hatch and Hunter Strojny each had an assist.