The Hackers Hockey Club and the Hamptons First Responders squared off at the Buckskill Winter Club Sunday night and on the night of Feb. 26, with the Hackers prevailing 4-3 in the first one and the First Responders edging the Hackers 10-9 in Sunday night’s finale.
Sunday’s was the third meeting of these teams this winter, though no one questioned could remember the result of the first encounter. Nor was there a consensus as to the final score on the 26th, some players saying it was 5-4 Hackers, others that it was 5-3. Britton Bistrian of Amagansett, who founded the First Responders with Ed Reid and Matt Kochanasz four years ago and also plays with the Hackers, has seen the First Responders’ roster swell from nine to 52 over that span. Its players include South Fork police officers, detectives, fire department and ambulance squad members, and lifeguards. The Hackers are in their 20th year.
The Hamptons First Responders played the Suffolk County Sheriff’s Office’s team at the UBS Arena Saturday afternoon, following the Islanders-Nashville Predators game.
“We held them in the first and second periods, but slipped in the third,” Bistrian said of the 11-6 loss. She added that “200 fans from here went. It was quite an experience — pretty neat.”
The first two periods in the Feb. 26 clash at Buckskill were scoreless, testifying to the fact that the teams were evenly matched. Both goalies parried all the shots that came their way in the first two frames, but then the floodgates, as it were, opened.
The Hackers’ Erik Peterson got it going with a breakaway goal in the opening minutes of the third. Soon after, Rich Sperber, from in close, put the First Responders on the board. Midway through the period, Brent Stoothoff, a First Responder defenseman, stole the puck near the center line, and, after zigging and zagging his way forward, treated the First Responders to a 2-1 lead, one that didn’t last long. A minute later, Adam Michael, a Hacker defenseman, who was arguably the best skater on the ice that night, broke away to tie the score at 2-2.
The goals kept coming in the final 13 minutes of play before Bill Grathwohl sent the Hackers home happy with a goal in the waning moments.
With so many goals having been scored in Sunday night’s rematch, Bistrian said she couldn’t remember who scored the game-winner. The goalies’ porousness that night could be ascribed, she said, to the bitter cold.
