Ice Hockey: Haverford goes with best for last … and then some in Flyers Cup upset

ASTON >> Haverford went to the power play nursing a one-goal lead with 3:57 to play against Ridley. Fords coach John Povey sent out his top unit of Kenny Kissinger and Marcus DiPrimio on the blue line, Mitchell Estes, Frankie McVeigh and Shane Moran up front. That quintet didn’t leave the ice again.

“If I’m going to lose, I’m going to lose with my top players on the ice,” Povey said. “They gave everything they had.” With the help of a timeout at the 1:53 mark, Kissinger and company closed out the No. 4 Green Raiders 2-1 as No. 13 Haverford advances to the quarterfinals of the AA Flyers Cup.

“I wasn’t losing that game, that’s for sure,” Kissinger said of the grueling final four minutes. “I was going to do whatever I had to do to make sure we got the ‘w’ tonight. Whether I was tired or not, I was staying out there.”

The upset couldn’t be entirely unexpected, even if Ridley came into the game riding high off a Central League title and a 19-1-1 season. The Fords gave the Green Raiders a good battle last Wednesday in a 4-2 defeat in the Central semifinals. And as their coach asserted, the more times you play a team, the more difficult the games become.

“The one thing I said to (them) is we’re a good hockey team,” Povey said. “We are, and obviously we didn’t have success against them in the regular season (a 5-1 Raiders win) and in the playoffs. I said to them, ‘It’s very tough to beat a good team three times.’” Haverford decided early that its top horses would play and play a lot. Povey double-shifted the Estes-McVeigh-Moran line, which combined for 154 regular season points, starting in the first period. The coach took a similar approach with his defensemen led by Kissinger and DiPrimio, who was playing just his fifth game of the season due to injury.

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Haverford’s Kenny Kissinger, right, scores a goal in the first period Wednesday night ahead of the defense by Ridley’s Nick Woods. Haverford claimed a 2-1 win in a Flyers Cup AA game. (Digital First Media/Robert J. Gurecki)