The Walpole Girls Hockey Team has been continuously matched against tough competition during the first few weeks of their 2011-2012 season. Against these difficult teams, the Rebels have worked hard to win two, tie one, and lose one. On Wednesday January 4, however, the Rebels were eager to play for an easy win over Brookline. A team can never predict exactly how they will match up against opponents due to incoming freshman and graduating seniors; however, the Rebels were confident in their ability to beat Brookline easily, and they assumed correctly. Not only did the Rebels Brookline, but they completely controlled the movement of the puck for almost the entire game, barely letting Brookline touch the puck.

Within the first 43 seconds of the game, junior Michaela Tosone passed to freshman Olivia Knight to score the first goal. Five minutes later, the score was already 4-0. During the last ten minutes of the first period, the Rebels scored four goals, ending the period with the Rebels winning 8-0. Senior Captain Cori Donahue scored three of those goals and assisted two, while her younger sister, sophomore Jenna Donahue, scored twice. The second period was just as easy for the Rebels, as the girls scored six more goals, and Brookline only scoring once. Defenders, sophomores Delaney Harrop and Brooke Matherson, even had their chance to play as forwards and get the puck in the net because there were no reasons to stay back in the defense zone and help defend the net with the goalies, Junior Captain Bethany Welch and sophomore Kaylin Hallet.

During the zamboni break between the second and third period, the Rebels Head Coach Joe Verdeber made the girls promise to stop scoring goals on the Brookline net, and treat the rest of the game as a practice to help sharpen some skills that were difficult to master during practice. “There was no point in having the team score more goals,” said Verderber. “It would only embarass the Brookline girls further, and would not prove that we had a great team. It would only prove that we like to show off, and that is not what our team or this sport is about.” For the remainder of the game, Verderber had the girls skate and practice passing techniques around Brookline, and he forbid the girls from showing off and scoring more goals–if they scored a goal, the girls would have to sprint for the entirety of Thursday’s afternoon practice. The Rebels obeyed their coach, not wanting to sprint for a full two hours the next day.

The Brookline game, though an easy win for the Rebels (the final score was 14-1, making the Rebels record 3-1-1), taught the girls more than how to score goals and win games. “The game definitely taught us how to play together as a team and how to have good sportsmanship on the ice,” Harrop said. “It’s tough for teens to not want to score, but because [Verderber] would not let us, we learned other important aspects of the game, like passing and teamwork, that could help us during the rest of the season.”