Brighton ices regional title trophy, 3-1

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HOWELL — After the Brighton hockey team won a regional title for the seventh time in eight y4ears on Saturday night, Howell athletic director John Young stood at center ice, ready to present the trophy to the Bulldogs.

No one came forward to claim it, so Young set the trophy on the ice.

The Bulldogs posed with it, from a safe distance, one presumes, then skated off the ice. It was eventually retreived by a team official.

The shunning was by orders of coach Paul Moggach.

“It’s just bad luck,” he said.

Is it bad luck, he was asked.

“Well, it could be,” Moggach admitted. “It’s better to leave it alone.”

Certainly, it was a reminder of what the Bulldogs have in their main focus” a shot at repeating as Division 1 state champion.

“In order to win a state championship, you’ve got to win a regional,” senior captain Sam Brennan said. “But we’re superstitious, so we  can’t touch that trophy.”

Brennan, as it turned out, set up what turned to be the backbreaking goal in a 3-1 Brighton win over Orchard Lake St. Mary’s at Grand Oaks Ice Arena.

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Taking a pass from Brody White, Brennan skated along the boards, then turned right, keeping an eye on defenders and teammates.

“Mathew Kahra popped up and popped out to the perfect spot,” Brennan said. “I dished it to him and he buried it.”

St. Mary’s had taken the lead early, the Eaglets being the beneficiary of early-game jiitters by the Bulldogs.

“They were flying around,” Moggach said. “We couldn’t wait to get on the ice.”

Finally, about four minutes in, he talked to his team while the game was still going on.

“We finally said, ‘Calm. Down.'” Moggach said. “We dpn’t practice that fast. We don’t do anything that fast. It was just their emotions. Their feet were going pretty good, so they weren’t slower. They were going too fast, and they weren’t tracking pucks like they needed to.”

St. Mary’s forward Troy Clark was the beneficiary, scoring at the 11:10 mark to give the Eaglets the lead.

It stayed that way the rest of the period, but St. Mary’s picked up what proved to be a fateful penalty with just two-tenths of a second left in the period.

The Bulldogs began the second period on the power play, and Tim Erkkila got Brighton on the board 53 seconds into the period.

“I honestly was looking for a tip,” Erkkila said. “Jason Verhelle had an awesome screen out front, and it took away the goalie’s eye. Lucklly, it found its way in.’

The pass came from Kahra, who gave Brighton the lead for good when he batted home a rebound of an Erkkila shot with 3:15 left in the period.

“They turned it over and had a questionable line change,” Erkkila said. “We had a 4-on-1 opportunity. I didn’t make the play I wanted to, and Mat Kahra picked up the puck, and you know the rest.”

Brighton will take on Lowell-Caledonia at the Summit in Dimondale in a Division 1 quarterfinal at 7:40 p.m. on Wednesday.

After the game, Moggach’s grandsons were carrying around the trophy, presumably without the threat of a decontamination protocol.

On the other hand, who’s to say Moggach isn’t right? After all, six trips to the finals in the last seven years, three of them ending with state titles, gives him latitude to say what is and isn’t bad luck.

Or, as Brennan put it: “Better safe than sorry.”

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