Blue Ridge kicks off season with wins

Blue Ridge's Garret Conlin (#12) attempts to maneuver around Montrose's Andrew Rosevear as Meteor Goalkeeper Jesse Rogers prepares for the shot attempt. Rogers had 10 saves in the game.
Blue Ridge’s Ben Bleck (#18) controls the ball as Montrose’s Andrew Rosevear (#13) closes in during their game last week. Bleck had two assists as the Raiders shut out the Meteors 7-0. Staff Photo Staci Wilson

Blue Ridge opened their Lackawanna League season with two wins to climb to an early Division II lead.

Montrose’s Ted Lubash (#23) heads the ball away from a trio of Blue Ridge Players during their game last week. The Raiders prevailed to improve their Lackawanna League record to 2-0 . Staff Photo Staci Wilson

Garrett Conklin and Gerald Welsted each scored twice to lead the Raiders to 5-1 win over Elk Lake.

Ben Bleck opened scoring with a goal from one of Ryan Mills’ three assists three minutes into the game. Elk Lake’s Caden Ramey knotted the score three minutes later off a feed from Noah Johnson.

Conklin gave Blue Ridge the lead for good with his first goal at the 18-minute mark off a pass from Mills.

Conklin opened the second-half scoring with goal off an assist from Jacob Birtch. Welsted added his two goals at the 58- and 63-minute marks off of feeds from Mills and Cameron Franks.

Jacob Morris collected two saves to preserve the Raiders’ win while Warrior goalkeeper Terrence Brozonis had six saves.

The Raiders earned their second win of the week with 7-0 shutout of Montrose.

Mills scored three goals and had another assist while Conklin added two goals. Welsted and David Wolf had the other two goals for Blue Ridge and Ben Bleck had two assists. Birtch and Franks also were credited with an assist.

Blue Ridge outshot Montrose 25-6. Morris had three saves while Meteor Goalkeeper Jesses Rogers had 10.

Blue Ridge’s Garret Conklin (#12) attempts to maneuver around Montrose’s Andrew Rosevear as Meteor Goalkeeper Jesse Rogers prepares for the shot attempt. Rogers had 10 saves in the game. Staff Photo Staci Wilson

Mountain View suffered two tough losses to open league play.

On Thursday, the Eagles lost a heartbreaker to nemesis Gregory the Great as Eli Ziglinski’s penalty kick in the second overtime lifted the Highlanders 6-5.

Mountain View trailed 2-0 early as Anthony Audino scored twice in the first 14 minutes. Ben DeMark put the Eagles on the board with a goal at the 21-minute mark and knotted the game ten minutes later when Mike DeWolfe scored the first of his three goals. Francis Rataj scored with three minutes to go to give Gregory the Great a 3-2 halftime lead.

Ziglinkski scored five minutes into the second stanza to push the lead to 4-2 before the Eagles came back to knot the score with two more goals from DeWolfe in a three-minute span. He found the back of the net off a Nathan Ofalt pass at 51 minutes and three minutes later scored unassisted.

John Bateman gave the Highlanders another lead three minutes later and Zach Polovitch knotted the score with a goal at the 64-minutes mark to set up Ziglinkski’s overtime heroics.

The Highlanders outshot the Eagles 27-13, but Mountain View Goalkeeper Connor Richmond recorded 17 saves to keep the Eagles in the game.

Two days earlier Riverside’s Brandon Reed broke free and scored the deciding goal with five minutes to go to lift the Vikings over Mountain View 3-2.

The Eagles had two goals from Caleb Eichelberger with Ofalt assisting on the first goal. Richmond had another 10 saves off 16 shots and Mountain View outshot Riverside 19-16.

 Elk Lake dropped their home opener 7-1 to Forest City as Jay Lipko had four goals and Corey Daniels added three to lead Forest City. Alex Braddish had the lone Warrior goal.

Forest City outshot Elk Lake 22-8. Ramey collected nine saves in the goal for the Warriors while Carmine Gigliotti recorded four for the Foresters.

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