GREENFIELD — Greenfield hockey coach Adam Bouchard’s message between the second and third periods on Monday night against Amherst must have been well received.

The Green Wave and Hurricanes found themselves knotted 2-2 going into the final 15 minutes of action, but it didn’t take Greenfield long to regain the lead in the third. The Green Wave won the faceoff, Luca Siano skated up the left side and dished it off to Jayson Smith. Smith raced toward the net before tossing the puck across the crease to Sammy Knight, and the senior buried the shot to put the Green Wave ahead, 3-2, just nine seconds into the third period. The Greenfield defense withstood the Amherst attack the remainder of the period to come away with a 3-2 independent victory at Collins-Moylan Arena.

“In between periods we had a discussion that we had to go hard and focus on playing our Green Wave game,” Bouchard said. “We felt in the first two periods [Amherst] really took it to us. Luckily for us, we skate hard at practice so we can grind through the whole game. Putting that third goal in and continuing to play as fast as we can really paid off. You always want to score that quickly. We talked about where to put it in on [Amherst goalie] Charlie [May] and they executed what we talked about. We shut it down from there.”

Amherst head coach Mike Rousseau was pleased with his squad’s effort, fighting until the final whistle, though the visitors were unable to find the equalizer.

“We played hard,” Rousseau said. “The one thing that was evident tonight was that little mistakes will cost us against good skating teams. All three of their goals, we didn’t do something as simple as pick up a hockey stick. I can’t say enough about our goaltending; Charlie [May] made a ton of great saves. Same with [Greenfield goalie] Josh [Bordeaux] on their end. I knew they were a good team but I’m proud of our boys.”

It was Amherst (5-7) that got out to a hot start in the first period. Hurricanes winger Yuuki Ishida got the puck on the wing, drove to the net and fired a shot across the crease to Jack Dyjach, who tapped it home past Bordeaux to give Amherst a 1-0 lead just 52 second into the contest.

“Josh is a hell of a goalie,” Rousseau said. “I coached him with the Western Mass. Vipers. One thing we know is that he’s a bigger kid so it’ll take him an extra second to get across. We told the kids to whip it across when they get the puck. We did it and scored a goal.”

Greenfield (12-4) held on for the remainder of the period, not allowing the Hurricanes to build on the early momentum gained. While the Green Wave didn’t tie the score before the buzzer sounded to end the period, they finished the frame with more shots on goal to build confidence for the remainder of the contest. 

“It could have avalanched from there,” Bouchard said. “That’s a good team. Josh came up with a handful of really big saves to hold us there. With about six minutes left in the period we found ourselves and ended up outshooting them. Kudos to Amherst, they played well. We were able to execute on the things we wanted to execute.” 

The Green Wave capitalized while each team was down a man early in the second period. Playing 4-on-4 following penalties on each team, Matt Lavoine received a pass from Hunter Smith and buried a shot past May to knot the score 1-1 with 13:36 to play in the frame. Jack Laurie also picked up an assist on the play. 

Two minutes later, Greenfield took its first lead of the game. Smith sent the puck to Matt Garvin, who rifled a shot on goal. May made the initial save on the left side of the goal, but the rebound kicked out to Jake Jurek in the slot, who sent a shot into the open net to give the Green Wave a 2-1 lead with 11:32 to play in the second. 

Greenfield’s lead didn’t last long. The Hurricanes went on the power play and made the Green Wave pay for it, with Liam Flynn blasting a shot that was also initially saved by Bordeaux, but Dyjach was there again to clean up the rebound and put the puck in goal to tie the game, 2-2, with 9:13 to play in the period.

Greenfield killed off six penalties following the game-tying goal, including two late in the third period, but Bordeaux continued to come up with big saves to prevent Amherst from lighting up the scoreboard. 

Bordeaux finished with 25 saves while May stopped 27 shots for the Hurricanes. 

“The early goal in the third put us on our heels a little bit,” Rousseau said. “I thought we responded pretty well. We did everything we wanted to do except score. This was a fun game and the kind of game you want to be involved with. Coach Bouchard has a great team, they’re well coached and they work hard. We work hard. This is one of the games where one goal short is going to be the difference.”

The game was another competitive independent game for the Green Wave as they gear up for the final push of the regular season before the postseason begins. 

“We love good, hard high school battles,” Bouchard said. “Just like every other game this year, there’s a lot of great high school hockey teams out here and a lot of great student athletes. This is a great independent game for us.” 

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