National Championship Wins Elude Girls Hockey Teams from Western PA

Team Pittsburgh, after rolling to three victories in pool play, lost to Little Caesars in overtime Saturday, 3-2, in the quarterfinal round of the Girls’ Midget 16 and under level at the Tier 1 National Championships in Rochester, MI.

Whitney Renn, who had tied the game in the second period, scored the game-winning goal for the Detroit-area victors at the 5:04 mark in overtime. After trailing 1-0 after the first period, Team Pittsburgh scored a pair of goals within four minutes of one another early in the second period to take a 2-1 lead: by Katie Matheny and Peters Township's Christina Zalewski. Matheny assisted on the second goal and Makenna Newkirk on both.

Renn, however, scored about 2 ½ minutes after the Zalewski goal, about midway through the second, and the game remained tied for more than 35 game minutes until she scored in overtime. Plum's Taylor Cestra made 31 saves in net for Team Pittsburgh.

Team Pittsburgh is one of three top-tier teams from Western Pennsylvania to complete in this weekend's ongoing 2011 girls Championships at the Onyx-Rochester and Suburban Ice Macomb arenas in suburban Detroit. The team plays out of the Airport Ice Arena in Moon.

Also making the trip to suburban Detroit were the Pittsburgh Penguins Elite U14 and U12 teams, which play at Robert Morris University's Island Sports Center in Neville Island. The three teams include several players from Western Pennsylvania.

Teams from around the country are battling to see who will hold the national title, including well-known teams sponsored by Little Caesars and the Honeybaked Hockey Club.

 In the Girls Bantam 14 and under, Emma Vlasic scored a natural hat trick – three goals in a row amid the first and second periods – to lift the Chicago Young Americans to a 4-0 victory over the Pittsburgh Penguins Elite in the quarterfinals Saturday.

Goaltender Sam Walther stopped 23 shots for the Penguins Elite. Her team went 0 for 5 on the power play and put 22 shots on goal, but couldn’t avert their first shutout of the national tournament. They finished 2-2 in the tournament.

Entering Sunday’s tournament finals, Penguins Elite forward Elizabeth Gerace was tied for 10^th in tournament scoring with three goals and six points in four games – the fewest of those top 10 leaders in the 14 and under level. She later dropped to 11th.

 The Girls’ Pee Wee 12 and under Penguins Elite went the deepest of the three Western Pennsylvania teams in the national championships, reaching the semifinal round Saturday night before losing 3-0 to Assabet Valley. They couldn’t dent Assabet Valley goaltender Kaitlyn Rooney on 14 shots in their only shutout of the tournament.  In winning three of their four previous games, they outscored the competition by 12-6 total.

 Penguins Elite’s Alyssa Peterson, who stopped 21 shots but gave up two goals to Audrey Hunt in the semifinal, ranked ninth among the top tournament goaltenders with a 1.75 goals-against average and seventh with a .920 save percentage before Sunday’s final.

 After going 2-1 in pool play, the Penguins Elite defeated the Massachusetts Spitfires by 3-1 in a quarterfinal earlier Saturday. Peterson allowed only a third-period goal after her teammates staked her to a 3-0 lead, on goals by  Alexis Grunden, Blossom Truell and Linda Essery. Truell was their second-leading scorer in the tournament with two goals and four points, and Essery was their leader with four goals and six points.

Local players in the tournament include Team Pittsburgh's Kelli Mackey, a ninth-grader at ; and Pittsburgh Elite's Maddie Mills, a sixth-grader at Other players with Western Pennsylvania ties include: goaltender Cestra, a 10th-grader and varsity player at Plum Senior High School;  Zalewski, a 10th-grader at Peters Township High School; and Haley Branovan, a 10th-grader from Wexford who attends Culver Academy in Culver, IN.

Kathy Pippy, of Moon, is director of girls hockey for Pittsburgh Penguins Elite, according to the team's website. She is the wife of state Sen. John Pippy and the mother of Katelyn Pippy, an actress and hockey goaltender who formerly played for Team Pittsburgh and now for Cornell University. 

For more results or standings, please go to the tournament website.

Fo more photos, stories and complete coverage, including coverage of the please go to Rochester-Rochester Hills Patch.