'Team 43' Delivers 1st Livonia Title
March 9, 2013
By Bill Khan
Special to Second Half
PLYMOUTH — Livonia is one of the great hockey communities in Michigan, but had never been home to an MHSAA Finals champion.
Until now.
Livonia Stevenson brought a championship to the birthplace of former NHL star Mike Modano, beating Hartland 5-4 in the Division 2 title game Saturday at Compuware Arena.
Prior to this weekend, Livonia's three hockey-playing schools had combined for only eight regional championships during the 39-year history of the MHSAA tournament and just one semifinal appearance (Stevenson in 1987). It doesn't help that the Livonia schools often encounter some of the state's perennial powerhouses early in the postseason. Stevenson has been eliminated 10 times by Detroit Catholic Central and five times by Trenton in regional play.
"I couldn't be happier for the Stevenson administration, the alumni and the whole Livonia community," fifth-year Stevenson coach David Mitchell said. "We're in the 43rd year of high school hockey in Livonia.
We're the 43rd team in Stevenson history. This is the first chance a Livonia school has had to play in a state final. To get it done, this is not just for Stevenson, but for all of Livonia high school hockey. We've had some great teams and some great kids go through our program. To do it is very special. Hopefully, the whole community can enjoy this."
To win its first championship, Stevenson denied Hartland the same opportunity. The Eagles had won 11 regional titles before this season, reaching the semifinals only twice until playing in their first final on Saturday.
Hartland coach Rick Gadwa praised captains Nick Pleshakov, Justin Bailey and Ned O'Boyle for laying the foundation for Hartland's first march to the championship game.
"These three guys changed Hartland hockey," Gadwa said. "It was their leadership on and off the ice. We put Hartland on the map. That's something that hopefully stays."
Junior Dominic Lutz was the star in Stevenson's historic season, scoring 42 goals with 32 assists in 31 games to easily lead the Spartans in scoring. It was fitting that the 6-foot, 185-pound forward scored the team's biggest goals in the championship game, popping in two in a 2:37 span of the second period to turn a 2-1 deficit into a 3-2 advantage. Stevenson never surrendered the lead.
"We've been preaching Team 43," Lutz said. "It's just great to see it all come together in the end. We've got it. It's unbelievable. We're like a family. This is the closest team I've ever played on."
Stevenson senior Travis Harvey, who scored two goals and had two assists in the semifinal on Friday, opened the scoring off a faceoff win at 4:55 of the first period. Hartland junior Austin Flores tied it off a
feed from Chris McRae at 6:26 of the first.
Despite being outplayed in the first period, Hartland found itself on top by a 2-1 count when McRae scored just 54 seconds into the second period.
The pace picked up considerably after that, as the teams combined for five goals during an 8:18 span. Stevenson took the lead for good on two goals by Lutz at 4:30 and 7:07 and Harvey's second goal of the game at
9:10.
O'Boyle brought Hartland within 4-3 at the 9:56 mark, only to have Stevenson regain a two-goal advantage at 12:48 on a goal by Ray Chartier.
"We would rather not play that way," Mitchell said. "We'd rather play a little more defensive and shut things down. These guys, when they see opportunities, they tend to go. We saw a few opportunities and
took some. Give Hartland credit. We were starting to look for goals and they caught us and they turned around and buried some of their own. They played an outstanding game."
"It was just go, go, go," O'Boyle said. "It was incredible emotionally."
Hartland didn't take long to trim the lead once the puck dropped in the third period, making it a 5-4 game on a goal by McRae at the 14-second mark.
The Eagles had eight more shots on net the rest of the game, but couldn't get another puck past Stevenson goalie Connor Humitz. Hartland called timeout with 2:21 left and pulled goalie Nick Wineka in the final minute, but couldn't generate a shot in that time against an aggressive Stevenson forecheck.
"We just want to keep it deep in their zone as much as we can," Lutz said. "Just gain the red line, get it deep and forecheck. We didn't want anything in our zone. We wanted everything down there, just keep
all the pressure off Connor. It seemed like it worked out."
Stevenson finished with a 23-7-1 record, while Hartland ended 19-9-2.
PHOTOS: (Top) Livonia Stevenson players celebrate a goal during Saturday's Division 2 Final in front of their fan section at Compuware Arena. (Middle) Hartland goaltender Nick Wineka makes one of his 35 saves Saturday. (Photos by Hockey Weekly Action Photos.)
DCC Becomes 1st Champ to Not Allow Playoff Goal on Way to 4th-Straight Title
March 11, 2023
PLYMOUTH — Detroit Catholic Central removed the most valuable commodity from its hockey opponents during the MHSAA Tournament.
Hope.
If the Shamrocks got a lead, the game was pretty much over, whether the teams they faced wanted to admit it or not.
You can’t beat a team without scoring a goal. Catholic Central became the first team in the 49-year history of the MHSAA tournament to not surrender a goal, capping a perfect defensive postseason with a 3-0 victory over Brighton in the Division 1 championship game before 4,090 fans Saturday night at USA Hockey Arena.
Catholic Central outscored five teams by a combined score of 30-0 during the playoffs. The previous record for the fewest goals allowed in the postseason was two, achieved by the 2009 Catholic Central team over six games.
“It starts with the forwards, and then the defense and then the goalies,” Catholic Central senior forward Landon West said. “We know we can’t win games by trying to outscore teams. You’ve got to keep pucks in front of your net. We do everything we can to do that.”
Backstopping the latest shutout was senior Luca Naurato, who stopped all 20 shots he faced. Naurato finished with a 0.87 goals against average, a .941 save percentage and seven shutouts.
“It’s just another game at the end of the day, right?” Naurato said. “I felt pretty confident going in after warm-ups, and it just happened to work out that way.”
Naurato alternated in net all season with fellow senior Kyle Moore, who had a 0.73 GAA, .948 save percentage and nine shutouts.
The Shamrocks, who won their fourth-consecutive Division 1 crown, have gone with a timeshare in net during the last three seasons. Nicholas Galda and Bob Masters rotated in net each of the past two seasons.
“It’s a team effort,” Naurato said. “We played a defensive game, and it translated into the offensive zone.”
Opponents know they must be almost perfect against the Shamrocks (29-1), who allowed only 22 goals in 30 games.
“They don’t give you anything easy,” said Brighton coach Kurt Kivisto, whose team lost 2-1 and 3-0 to Catholic Central this season. “They don’t make mistakes. They’re really, really structured. They play an honest, hard-working game. They’re really deep, and that makes it difficult.”
The Bulldogs were a team known for coming back from multiple-goal deficits this season, but that’s nearly an impossible task against Catholic Central.
Although the shots were close, with the Shamrocks holding a 24-20 edge, Catholic Central was never seriously threatened after taking a 2-0 lead in the first period on goals by Jackson Walsh and Nolan Galda.
“They’re a tough team,” Kivisto said. “They don’t give you much and we were chasing the game a little bit. I really like the way we played in the second. We had a lot of opportunities there in the third; we weren’t able to capitalize. Naurato was really good in net.
“We know to beat them, you probably have to win special teams, and we weren’t able to do that tonight.”
Walsh scored the final goal of the 2022-23 season into an empty net with 1:54 left in the game.
“It wasn’t pretty,” Shamrocks coach Brandon Kaleniecki said. “I thought we turned over a lot of pucks. We didn’t want to give them chances and space, because you can’t afford to do that against a team like that.
“They’re really good. They’re going to create their own and we kind of fed into that and we took some penalties, so at that point we were on our heels, kind of the middle of the second, a lot of penalty killing and stuff like that. In a situation like that we just needed to grind it out and find a way. And that’s what the guys did.”
Catholic Central beat Brighton in the last two Division 1 championship games. The teams have dominated the division, meeting in six of the last 10 Finals. Before the Shamrocks’ current run of four straight titles, the Bulldogs won two in a row in 2017 and 2018.
Brighton goalie Levi Pennala made 21 saves in his second start in the championship game. The junior all-stater will be looking to bring the title back to Brighton next year.
“We’ve got a lot of guys on this team that are young,” Pennala said. “We’re gonna come back stronger next year. It sucks, but we’re lucky to have one more year.”
PHOTOS (Top) Detroit Catholic Central goalie Luca Naurato reaches high for a potential save during his team's 3-0 shutout of Brighton. (Middle) The Bulldogs' Nathan Daavettila (17) and the Shamrocks' Griffin Crampton pursue the puck.