'Put in the work': Central Cambria claims 1st LMHL title over Forest Hills
JOHNSTOWN, Pa. – The Central Cambria High School hockey team had waited nearly two decades to celebrate on the 1st Summit Arena @ Cambria County War Memorial ice.
The Red Devils didn’t mind extending that anticipation a bit longer – until midway through the second period when Central Cambria broke open Thursday’s Laurel Mountain Hockey League title game.
Central Cambria’s Thomas Smith and Zachary Lockard scored a pair of short-handed goals 55 seconds apart during the same penalty kill, and Austin Semelsberger netted five goals and seven points in the top-seeded Red Devils’ 11-5 victory over second-seeded Forest Hills.
“We started a little bit slow,” first-year Central Cambria coach Bryce Boring said.
“The short-handed goals, just like Tuesday night (in a semifinal win) – those jumped the gun for us and we were off and running after that.
“I’m just proud of these guys all season long. They put in the work.”
Central Cambria players and coaches hoisted the Ann Harris Smith Cup on the ice after the Red Devils completed a 17-2-1 season with a championship run.
Forest Hills finished 15-4-1 season.
The Rangers forged a 2-all tie after one period and the score was 3-all through the first eight minutes of the second frame.
“This means a lot to us. First one in history,” said Boring, a former Red Devils goaltender on the LMHL runner-up team in 2016.
“Tom Eckenrod has been here 18 years and he’s built this program up,” Boring said of the former Central Cambria head coach who celebrated with the team as an assistant coach Thursday. “This is for him.
“This is his last game, too.”
The game’s momentum shifted as the Red Devils scored a pair of short-handed goals to take a two-goal lead in the second period.
“Every time we’d score one, they’d come back against us,” said Lockard, who followed Smith’s short-handed tally at 8:05 with one of his own at 9:00 to make it 5-3. “We found a way to get the second consecutive one and that was huge for us.
“It killed their momentum and gave us way more momentum, and we just kept building on that,” added Lockard, who totaled three goals and five points.
Jett Williams added another Red Devils goal with 1:42 left in the middle period to make it 6-3. Central Cambria added five third-period goals to pull away.
“We came out really hot every single period and that’s huge,” Semelsberger said. “We just kind of wore them out. We stuck the pedal to the metal the whole way and just wore them out.”
Semelsberger scored 11 seconds into the game after a favorable bounce on the first shift.
“I just chipped it and looked over to my buddy Zach (Lockard) and it was in the back of the net,” Semelsberger said.
Forest Hills’ Connor Wolfhope’s power-play goal from inside the left-wing circle tied the score at 3:29.
The Red Devils regained the advantage via Semelsberger’s second goal just over a minute later. The Rangers’ Chase Secriskey knotted the score again with a goal at 8:56.
The back-and-forth continued in the second period.
Semelsberger completed a hat trick with a goal at 6:12, but Wolfhope found the net from point-blank range only 22 seconds later to set a 3-all score.
“It was unreal,” Boring said of his line of Semelsberger, Lockard and Brayden Rado. “Those two guys and Rado on the red line were on tonight. Every phase of the ice, they were on.”
The Red Devils netted three goals in the opening 4:46 of the final period to lead 9-3.
Park scored on a power play 2:07, and Lockard had back-to-back goals at 4:18 and 4:46.
Semelsberger tallied his fourth goal of the game at 9:25, his team’s seventh in a row, to make it 10-3 and put a running clock into motion.
Forest Hills rebounded with back-to-back goals by Isaac Dibble and Secriskey before Central Cambria’s Semelsberger hit the net a fifth time with just over four minutes left.
“It’s really amazing to finally bring it home,” Semelsberger said.
Central Cambria outshot Forest Hills 50-21.
Forest Hills coach John Kubas said the title game setback will sting, but his coaches and players will look at the big picture.
“We got outworked,” Kubas said. “We were short-handed player-wise, but they just wanted it more than we did.”
“Our goal was to get to this game this year, which we did. Our perseverance. We believed in each other and that’s why we’re here now.”
Mike Mastovich is a sports reporter and columnist for The Tribune-Democrat. He can be reached at (814) 532-5083. Follow him on Twitter @Masty81.
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