Poliak’s 4 goals, Dowd’s hat trick lead CB West past Souderton

HATFIELD TWP. >> Playing straightforward ice hockey was the path to success for Sammy Poliak and Central Bucks West Wednesday night.

“Keeping it simple here is the key in high school,” Poliak said. “Just getting pucks in deep, just passing to our teammates, not being selfish and just going in with speed.”

After scoring the opening tally in the Bucks’ SHSHL National Division contest against Souderton, Poliak was up to a hat trick in recording the first two of West’s four second-period goals that pushed its lead over the Indians to 6-1.

“Huge shout out to the wingers getting it to me through the center with speed,” Poliak said. “I think that’s a huge bonus in high school, beating guys with speed. And just getting it to the net.”

Poliak found the net one more time in the third to end up with four goals and an assist, Anthony Dowd added four-point effort with three goals and an assist and CB West earned its second straight win by cruising past Souderton 10-4 at Hatfield Ice.

“We started out slow, that’s how it usually is, I think, sometimes these late games in high school, got school in the morning,” Poliak said. “But second period we just put shots on this goalie, he’s a new goalie so we try to get in deep and just shoot it.”

The Bucks (5-9-0-0, 3-4-0-0 division) opened the week edging North Penn 5-4 in overtime Monday to snap a six-game losing streak. Poliak scored the extra-session winner against the Knights and Wednesday the senior gave CB West a 1-0 lead off a Dowd assist at 8:56 in the first period.

Luke Tremmel doubled the advantage at 5:04 but 17 seconds later Sean Ryan’s goal pulled Souderton (4-9-0-1, 2-6-0-0) to within 2-1.

Poliak, however, put the Bucks back up two with his second tally less than three minutes into the second period at 14:23. He then collected a third at 7:52 on the power play.

“Good give-and-go, we’ve done that a bunch of times with (Adam) Ricci, with Dowd here,” said Poliak of the goal. “So good play by wingers on the walls.”

West extended its lead to 5-1 as Nicholas Bruno scored with the man advantage while Dowd struck for the first of his three goals, driving to the net and scoring with 62 seconds left in the period.

“I got a penalty early, I was kind of frustrated,” Dowd said. “So I was just focused on getting pucks out and head-manning the puck up to Sammy, he buried most of the chances I gave him.”

Tremmel and Bruno each had a goal and three assists for the Bucks. Ricci totaled a goal and two assists while Zane Sanders registered a pair of assists.

“Great momentum,” Poliak said. “Momentum swings big in high school, coming off the OT win on Monday, huge momentum going into this game, scoring early and then picking it up in the second period as well.”

Souderton’s Matthew Malanga finished with a goal and two assists. Jacob Chow added a goal and an assist for Big Red with Nicholas Smith dishing out two assists.

CB West goalkeeper Liam Rogers made 43 saves on 47 shots while Souderton netminder Connor Paulus had 30 saves on 40 shots.

The Bucks try for a third win in a row Thursday taking on Pennsbury 9 p.m. at Grundy Ice Arena. Souderton, which has lost its last three, next plays Wednesday, Feb. 1 against Bensalem 7:20 p.m. at Grundy.

“Feels pretty good,” Dowd said. “We’re one of the lower teams in the league right now, feel like we could really maybe come back and maybe have a chance at playoffs.”

In the third period, the Indians cut the deficit to 6-2 on a tally from Chow with 10:51 remaining but Central Bucks West responded with the next three goals.

“Just the rushes up the ice – we had a lot of good rushes up the ice that just led to goals,” Dowd said.

Dowd slipped the puck around a defender then found the back of the net with 8:06 remaining. After a Ricci goal made it 8-2, Dowd struck again to complete his hat trick.

After goals from Souderton’s Maxwell Ryan and Malanga, Poliak notched his fourth tally of the night with 2:11 left.