Cerulo Saves 40 as Warriors Win in OT Shootout

BILLERICA--When Kevin Doherty skated out to center ice last night at the Chelmsford Forum as Wakefield’s fifth and final penalty taker, the junior forward didn’t need a reminder of what was at stake.

With the Warriors leading the overtime shootout 3-2, and with only one Billerica player left to shoot, Doherty was well aware all that stood between his team and a trip to the Div. 1 North Championship game was half the rink and standout Billerica goaltender Bob Bourgeois.

Bearing down on the Indians' goal, the junior forward deked left, then went to the right and flicked the puck past the helpless Billerica netminder, sending a sea of red and white jerseys streaming from the bench onto the ice. Doherty’s converted penalty sealed a 4-3 (OT shootout) win for No. 7 Wakefield against the third-seeded Indians before a raucous crowd at the MIAA North Sectional Semifinals.

“Once I touched the puck, it was almost like a blur. I knew the move I was going to do, and I stuck with it,” said the visibly jubilant Dohery following the game. “This is probably the happiest moment of my life, I can’t even explain it ... I was nervous, but I was confident in my move. I knew I had it the whole way.”

Defensemen Dan Cardillo and Pat McCarthy scored first-period goals for Wakefield (13-6-4), while Adam Giancola scored in the third. John Sartell and Brian Melanson each chipped in with an assist.

The Warriors will now face top-seeded St. Mary’s of Lynn in the final at the Chelmsford Forum on Saturday at 7:30, after showing up just in time to watch them dismantle Winchester 8-2 in the evening’s earlier contest.

Before the dramatic ending to last night’s game, there was 55 minutes of hard-hitting, frenetic hockey to navigate through, and during that span, Wakefield goaltender Joe Cerulo was rock solid between the posts. The junior stopper recorded 40 saves on the night, not counting his crucial pair of thwarted Billerica (12-3-8) penalty attempts.  

“I was a little nervous at first, but we’ve been going over breakaways at practice so that really helped us,” said Cerulo. “It’s very nerve-wracking, but you have to rise above it ... I like to stay out ... I’d rather have (the shooter) make the deke so I can commit over to one side and cut their options off.”

Billerica outshot Wakefield 43-19 during the game, and Cerulo parried oncoming pucks as if he were reading the Indians’ minds at times, and among his hefty saves total, none were bigger than his stops on Billerica’s Ross Murphy and John Kelleher in the shootout. 

“We had opportunities, we knew (Cerulo) was a good goalie,” said Billerica head coach Mike Mastrullo. “We knew he made the first save and we would have to go to the net, and go there with determination, and we did do that ... but it’s playoff hockey, and anything can happen and goaltending is probably 95 percent of it.”

For Warriors’ head coach Derek Edgerly, while he was obviously and understandably over the moon with the victory, he expressed his disdain for the use of the shootout to decide such pivotal postseason contests.

“It was a great win and I’m glad we won, but I don’t like to win or lose in a shootout,” he said. “I just don’t like it to come down to a shootout, but I’ll take it.”

Mastrullo echoed the opposing bench boss’s sentiments on the subject.

“The game shouldn’t be decided that way,” he said. “It’s not the way you want to win games, and it’s not the way you want to lose games, but everybody knows going into the tournament that it might come down to that.”

Underclassman-laden Wakefield has now knocked off the second and third seeded teams in its bracket, having also dispatched No. 2 Reading in the quarterfinals last Saturday by a narrow 1-0 margin, and Edgerly was at a loss for words when asked to comment on his team’s play this season.

“I don’t know what to say ... these guys have been playing great for me all year,” he said. “I have 12 sophomores, so there’s not much more I can say about that, they’ve just been playing unbelievable.”

With the game even heading into the third, Billerica had outshot Wakefield 22-11 up to that point, but it took just one shot and 48 seconds for the Warriors to regain the upper hand, when senior co-captain Giancola seized possession from a Billerica defenseman behind the Indians’ net and promptly swung around and stuffed the puck past Bourgeois, giving the Warriors a 3-2 lead with just over 14 minutes standing between them and the title game.

But there was a lot more hockey still to be played, and Billerica had no intention of going down without a fight.

With just over two minutes remaining, after a deflected shot on the Wakefield goal resulted in a wild scramble for the puck in front of Cerulo, Ross Olsson got a stick on it and flipped the puck past the helpless netminder, sending Indians fans into a celebratory frenzy and the game into extra time.

While both teams had several chances at the net during the overtime, the best opportunity for the Warriors to avoid settling matters with a shootout came towards the end of the 10 minute period when Doherty was beautifully set up to score, and a had clear shot at the net, but was unable to get the puck on target, sending the semifinal battle to be decided on penalties.