It may have taken the Rye Garnets a little while to get going on Friday night, but once they did they demonstrated why they came into the 2020-21 season with such lofty expectations. Facing Division I powerhouse Mamaroneck in their season opener, the Garnets surrendered two early goals before rallying to top the Tigers 4-3 in overtime on a score by Brendan O’Byrne.
Coming into the game, Rye head coach Peter Thomas acknowledged that it was possible that the Garnets—getting their first taste of competition this winter—might be at a disadvantage against the Tigers, who kicked off the season last weekend with two wins at a tournament in Albany. That seemed to bear itself out in the early goings, as Mamaroneck’s Chris Mathews found the net twice within the span of a minute. But Rye regrouped and began to control the puck, eventually getting one back with 5:40 left to play when Tommy Greenhaw found the net off an assist from Tommy Richardson.
“One of the things we were fearful of coming in was that we’d have a little more rust,” explained Thomas. “But to the team’s credit, we didn’t get rattled, we didn’t get fazed, and when Greenhaw scored that goal to make it 2-1, I think that gave us some momentum heading into the second period.”
Rye would build on that momentum in the next stanza, tying the game up on a Lukas Elovaara goal with 5:20 left in the period. They would take their first lead of the game the following period when Dempsey Brown beat Tiger net-minder Max Baker with a wrist shot. Although Riku Takaya would even things up a few minutes later to send the game into overtime, O’Byrne would get the game-winner for Rye just 2:49 into the extra time.
According to Thomas, the fact that a number of players with little-to-no varsity experience stepped up to help the Garnets down a highly-touted opponent like Mamaroneck is an encouraging sign of things to come.
“The fact that we had three new faces in Greenhaw, Elovaara and Dempsey Brown play a big part, that answered some of our questions,” he said. “Having those new guys step right into prominent roles was really nice to see.”
With the loss, Mamaroneck falls to 2-1 on the year, but will look to get back in the win column this week when it tangles with an ETBE squad that has emerged as a true playoff nemesis over the last two seasons. Rye will look to improve upon its first outing when it hosts Brewster on Dec. 8, after press time.
“Obviously we were happy with the result against Mamaroneck, but what we’re going to work on is getting out to a quicker start,” said Thomas. “We don’t want to continually end up in situations where we have to dig ourselves out.”
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