John Stark/Hopkinton beats Berlin in overtime to win D3 boys hockey championship

MANCHESTER – When the John Stark/Hopkinton boys hockey team played Berlin the first time, the Generals had their worst day of the season.

When the two teams met for a second time in Saturday’s Division III championship game, it was the Mountaineers turn for a bad day.

Simon Hunter capitalized on a turnover in the Berlin zone, going high to put a shot past goalie Shane Mailhot at 11:30 of overtime to give No. 2 John Stark/Hopkinton a 3-2 win over the top-seeded Mountaineers at the Verizon Wireless Arena.

The win avenged the Generals’ 8-2 loss – their only one of the season, going 19-1-1 – earlier in the year and was the first defeat of the season for Berlin (20-1).

“We were heading to Berlin, which was the first thing that went wrong,” Hunter said of the game on Jan. 19. “We were missing four people and our goalie (Connor McDonald) got a concussion at the end of the first period. We had everything going against.”

McDonald played the entire game this time, stopping 30 shots, although he did allow a goal to Berlin’s Connor Jewett in the second period that tied the game at 2.

“I was the only goalie he hadn’t scored against,” McDonald said of Jewett, who scored 56 goals during the regular season. “We really needed to shut him down and I think I did a pretty decent job considering he took a lot of shots. The defense was the best it’s been all year.”

Berlin coach Michael Poulin couldn’t believe the outcome after the game.

“I’m at a loss for words at this point,” he said. “You go through a season and you grow and you grow and you get to the end, and the pressure, it’s tough.

“I always tell my kids to pick their heads up. They have nothing to be ashamed of. We had a target on our back from Game 1 to 21. I thought the kids did a good job dealing with that all through the season. We were the hunted.”

The Generals also got goals from Simon Becka and Peter Sawitsky, who got his team the all-important first goal on the power play at 3:53 of the first period. The 1-0 lead stood for the rest of the period, and into the second, when Berlin’s Brandon Poulin tied the game with 8:01 left in the period.

But the Generals came right back, getting Becka’s goal less than two minutes after the Mountaineers tied it.

Jewett knotted the game again with 4:04 left in the second, picking up a loose puck near the boards and squeezing a shot between the near post and McDonald.

John Stark/Hopkinton had opportunities to take the lead in the third, getting five power play chances in the period, but Berlin was able to control play for large portions of each man-advantage.

“We took way too many penalties,” Poulin said. “When we got to the four-on-four part (at the end of the third), we felt all right. We had some opportunities, generated some offense, and even shorthanded we did, but it came down to a depth game. We had a two-on-one right before that that could have been game over.”

With about four minutes left in overtime, the Mountaineers ended up with a great scoring chance, but Mike Lemoine couldn’t handle Jewett’s pass and play went the other way. Hunter stepped in front of a clearing attempt, and moments later, ended the game.

“I saw the top right open and roofed it,” he said. “That was a gift. Everyone is tired and it’s been a long game and a long season. Everyone is nervous.

I noticed the whole game that the goalie was going down, so I decided to roof it. I don’t even remember scoring, I just remember people jumping on me in the corner.”

It took McDonald a moment to realize what had happened from the other end of the ice.

“I saw a big jumble of bodies and then I see Simon take it out and then the water bottle (on top of the goal) just exploded,” McDonald said. “I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t know if he had scored. I was so tired, I didn’t want to run down the ice. Me and Tom (Zervos), we’re best buds, we had our own little celebration (at center ice). There’s nothing like it.”