Garnets Hockey Clinches #1 Seed with Comfortable Win vs North Rockland

Rye Hockey clinched the top seed in the playoffs with their ninth win in a row on Tuesday, February 18, defeating North Rockland 6-2 on the road. The Garnets end the regular season 14-5-1 after starting 5-5-1, and a big reason for their success has been a strong offense. That showed again on Tuesday night, as Rye put up six goals.

“I thought we played a strong road game,” Head Coach Pete Thomas told MyRye.com after the game. “[We] close out the regular season on a 9-game heater.”

Will Niejadlik opened the scoring on a beautiful pass from his brother Max after Matt Giannetti won a board battle to give Rye a 1-0 lead after one period of play. In the second, the Garnets exploded for four more tallies: Ryan Draddy (assisted by Will Weinman), Colin Nigro (game-winning goal, assisted wonderfully by Finn Draddy), Trevor Dolan (unassisted power play goal) and Jamie Morris (also unassisted PPG) piled it on. Rye took a 5-1 lead into the second intermission.

Ryan Draddy got his second of the night on the power play from Tyler McDermott and Max Niejadlik to close out the scoring, as he and M. Niejadlik both picked up their second points of the night. After giving up five power play goals to Suffern in that Sport-o-Rama building to open the regular season, Rye closed it by scoring three times on the man advantage themselves, albeit against a different opponent.

In goal, Owen Fitzgibbons shined with 22 saves on 24 shots (.917 save percentage) to pick up his third win of the year. He also earned player of the game honors for his stellar play, which was crucial with the Garnets on the second half of a back-to-back scenario.

Rye (14-5-1) will be the favorites to emerge from their postseason bracket, and will look for their tenth win in a row in round one, which will be at Playland Ice Casino. The date and opponent for that game are still TBD.