Warriors score with 5 seconds left to stun Winchester

CHRISSY WEEDEN, during her first game as head coach of the Warriors, celebrates with her team after captain Brooke Lilley scored with five seconds left to tie Winchester 4-4 on Tuesday night at O’Brien Ice Rink. (Dan Pawlowski Photo)

By DAN PAWLOWSKI

WOBURN — How’s that for game one?

Facing a 4-2 deficit with three minutes left against Winchester on Tuesday night at O’Brien Ice Rink, the Wakefield High girls’ hockey team decided their season wouldn’t start this way.

“In the third period, the momentum was shifting and I saw that look in their eyes; they were ready to go,” said Wakefield head coach Chrissy Weeden. “I’m not surprised they pulled it off. First game of the season and they turned it around like it was the state

CAROLINE LILLEY celebrates with her teammates after the first last-second Lilley goal of the game. Caroline scored with seven seconds left in the second period to cut the Winchester lead to 3-2. (Dan Pawlowski Photo)

championship.”

Just seconds after Wakefield goalie Abby Boudreau made another sharp glove save, the Warriors put their hard hats on and went to work in the Winchester crease, where junior Annabella Forziati put one home off assists from freshmen Kayli Porter and Bailey McDevitt to make it 4-3 with 2:31 left.

With Wakefield leaving it all on the ice during a grinding game against the very team (and in the same building) that knocked them out of the playoffs last year, Coach Weeden took her first timeout as a head coach with 2:04 left. It was an equal parts, breather, strategy session and reminder of the moment: lets go get one more.

“We just kept telling them: get the puck in the zone and shoot it on net,” said Weeden.

Pushed on by the Wakefield faithful, and buoyed by Weeden’s band of Burlingtonians and Conceison’s, the Warriors pulled their goalie, survived a scare as a long Winchester shot hit their post and got the puck into the offensive zone with the seconds flying away.

Associate captain Hope Melanson, a forward who was shifted back to help a shorthanded defense, kept a clearing attempt in front of the blue line and from the left point, rifled a shot at the net as the clock ticked to single digits. Awaiting a rebound in front was captain Brooke Lilley, who hammered in her second goal of the night to send the Warrior bench into a frenzy with 5.1 seconds showing on the clock. Boudreau gobbled up her 28th save of the night on a last-second Winchester slapper and somehow, someway, the Warriors escaped O’Brien with a 4-4 tie.

“It’s a tie that feels like a win, that’s for sure,” said Weeden.

Boudreau made her first miraculous save of the season on a breakaway five minutes into the first period. Winchester’s relentless attack outshout Wakefield 32-12 in this one, but Boudreau, facing the same team she battled last year as an 8th-grader, made it clear from that first stop that any goal would have to be earned.

“Abby kept us in it the whole game,” said Weeden. “We got outshot by a landslide, but she was so composed. When she stopped that first breakaway, I think she got the ‘I-can-do-this’ feeling. She’s a freshman, she’s still young, but she looked like a seasoned veteran tonight.”

Winchester struck first after sophomore Katie Cronin had an impressive individual effort to make it 1-0.

The response from Wakefield would be swift. About two minutes after the goal, the Warriors tied it when Brooke Lilley finished a nice feed from her sister, freshman Caroline Lilley. Erin Heffernan also had an assist on the play. It won’t be the last goal-assist combo from the Lilley’s this season, but this first one helped send Wakefield into the initial intermission with a boost of confidence.

Winchester came out firing in the second but Boudreau made another stop on a breakaway just seconds into the frame. Winchester scored the next two and were very close to putting a stranglehold on this one. Caroline Lilley stole the momentum when she flew down the right wing and saw her centering pass bounce in off a defender with seven seconds left in the second to make it 3-2 after two.

Winchester’s fourth goal was scored 53 seconds into the third, before Wakefield’s epic comeback.

The tie will most certainly have the Warriors pumped up for their next game against Reading who beat Watertown 6-2 last night.

“This will be a huge boost going into Saturday (vs. Reading),” said Weeden. “It will be a tough game for us but I think with this momentum that we have right now, I’m sure they’re on some sort of cloud nine that’s going to carry them into Saturday.”

The puck drops against Reading at Burbank Arena on Saturday night at 7:45 p.m.