Cooper Palazzolo's hat trick helps Vianney kick off postseason with comeback win over SLUH

By Joe Harris | Special to STLhighschoolsports.com

MANCHESTER — Vianney junior Cooper Palazzolo has had quite a memorable two days.

One night after recording a hat trick for his club team, Palazzolo did the same in leading the Golden Griffins to a 3-1 win over St. Louis U. High in the opening game of the Mid States Club Hockey Association Challenge Cup round robin playoff round at Queeny ice rink on Thursday night.

“You're providing for your team, you know, all your lines and your coaches and it's a lot of fun,” Palazzolo said. “Playoff hockey is where it really matters.”

All three of Palazzolo’s goals came in the third period as Vianney erased a 1-0 deficit, but his second one at 7:38 came with controversy. Palazzolo’s shot went off the stick of SLUH goalie Brian Cooke and bounced precariously along the goal line.

Vianney’s players and bench immediately cheered for the goal, but the referee waved it off and play continued for almost another minute until the next stoppage when the linesmen and referee met and reversed the call and put the time back on the clock.

“All I knew is I shot it and from the angle I had, you know, I couldn't see it, but from what everybody else was saying, I think it was a goal,” Palazzolo said.

Vianney co-coach Joe Cero concurred.

“You can tell by the way it bounced,” Cero said. “It was clear as day.”

SLUH coach Steve Walters saw it differently.

“I didn’t see it go in and I was standing right there,” Walters said. “But the lineman thought it was in. They said both linesmen thought it was in and the referee missed it. It is what it is.”

There was no doubt on Palazzolo’s third goal, which came on a shorthanded breakaway to seal the game at 11:12.

“It’s an all junior and sophomore team here and they have to catch fire early in a tournament like this, I think we did right now,” Vianney co-coach Kevin McGlynn said. “But we got a different (playoff) format now. We've got three more games.”

Chase Vogelgesang made 25 saves for Vianney (10-11-0).

Dean Lyon scored and Cooke made 12 saves for SLUH (14-6-1).

Both goalies starred in a scoreless first period. Vogelgesang robbed SLUH’s Logan Petlansky on a point-blank chance early in the frame, while Cooke used a full splits dazzling save to stop a Golden Griffin chance late.

“It's just all preparation,” Vogelgesang said. “I was here two hours before just working. I knew the boys were going to be big tonight. And then we just rolled with it.”

Lyon finally dented the scoreboard for SLUH with a power play goal at 10:34 of the second period, burying the rebound of a Petlansky shot.

“We just have to play a little grittier,” Walters said. “We were taking a lot of perimeter shots and not making a lot happen in front of the net.”

Cooke made the lead stand up with a tough save on an Owsley Mejia Troop chance on an odd man rush for Vianney in the middle frame’s final seconds.

Palazzolo evened the game for Vianney at 5:07 of the third period, burying a perfect feed from Evan Smarko.

“Just coming out the gates firing on all cylinders,” Palazzolo said. “It's a fast, hard physical game and we played that tonight. You know, we might have had some doubts from everybody that is in Mid States hockey about us coming to this game and maybe winning, but you know, we proved them wrong. We came in and won.”

Playoff picture

The round robin consists of 10 teams in two groups of five. Only the top two from each group advance to the semifinals making the margin for error slim. SLUH is the No. 4 overall seed and the second highest seed in Pool A, while Vianney is the No. 7 seed overall and is the fourth highest team in Pool B.

“We’ve competed with every team in the league this year,” Walters said. “I know it's cliché, but we have to take it one game at a time. We’re confident we can beat anybody when we play our game and we’re going to win it out.”