St. Anthony’s freshman hockey team capped off a dominant regular season with a 6-3 victory over Southampton on Thursday at South, completing a perfect 3-0 season series behind Southampton’s Cam Minardi‘s hat trick performance. The Friars improved to 14-2 overall while spoiling what proved to be a milestone night for Minardi, who entered the contest with 33 goals in 15 games and added three more to his impressive freshman campaign.
The game remained deadlocked through much of the opening two periods, with Landon Ivezaj and Minardi trading goals in the first before Logan McCauley and Ivezaj‘s second of the night sandwiched around Minardi’s second goal gave St. Anthony’s a 3-2 advantage heading into the final frame. The turning point came early in the third when Nicholas Neuner scored what proved to be the game-winner on the penalty kill at 5:57, capitalizing on a Southampton power play opportunity to put the Friars ahead for good.
Minardi completed his hat trick on the power play at 3:01 of the third period, assisted by Aidan Dangelo, but St. Anthony’s responded with goals from Jake Evans and an empty-netter from Nicholas Tizzano in the final two minutes to seal the victory. The loss dropped Southampton to 11-8 overall despite strong offensive performances from Minardi and Martin Osullivan, who added an assist to go with his six penalty minutes. St. Anthony’s received balanced scoring with Ivezaj (2 goals), Evans, Neuner, and Tizzano each finding the back of the net, while McCauley contributed a goal and Reginald Henry III added an assist.
The victory marked St. Anthony’s third win over Southampton this season, having previously defeated them 8-4 in September and 6-3 in a March meeting, establishing clear superiority in the season series between these SCHSHL freshman programs.
