Benchings open door for Hartland hockey freshman to score 3 goals in win over Northville

HARTLAND — If Jake Pietila left Hartland Sports Center Wednesday night still searching for his first high school hockey goal, it wouldn’t be for lack of ice time.

With several of the Eagles’ veterans benched for a violation of team policy, opportunity abounded for players like Pietila, a freshman forward who has slowly been acclimating to the high school game.

He took full advantage of the extra playing time, scoring his first, second and third career goals in a 6-1 victory over Northville.

Pietila entered the night with just one assist in nine games.

“I started off slow the whole first half of the year,” Pietila said. “I didn’t want to keep that on me. I decided I should put a few in today. It definitely helps me get some confidence, for sure.”

Hartland played eight forwards and five defensemen. Pietila skated with fellow winger James Storm, while centers Ben Pouliot and Ian Kastamo rotated through three lines.

Nobody who played for the Eagles could complain about ice time.

“Oh, yeah, I got plenty of ice time,” Pietila said. “A little shorter at the beginning of the year and I got a lot today.”

It’s difficult for a freshman to crack the lineup at Hartland, which has won three of the last four Division 2 state championships. Only five ninth-graders have made the team in the past nine seasons, including Pietila and current defenseman Eli Sturos.

“Jake’s a guy, he’s got some magic in his stick,” Hartland coach Rick Gadwa said. “Watching him in some of our preseason stuff, I saw the way he could bury the puck; you can’t have enough of those guys. But then you watch what he did when he didn’t have the puck, away from it; he’s got a good I.Q. He’s a player who could definitely have a bright future here.”

A year ago, it was Kastamo who got his initial high school goal as a freshman in the first game after Christmas break. A little more than two months later, Kastamo scored in overtime to give Hartland the state championship.

“Jake’s a natural,” Gadwa said. “The pucks’ natural off his stick. He’s got a knack for the net. Early in the season, he’s not getting as many looks at the net as we’d hoped for, but that stuff comes. You saw it last year with Ian Kastamo. It wasn’t until after the break he scored his first goal. So, this is the kind of thing that can really catapult a young player.”

Hartland played without some of its top players, who were in uniform but never took the ice.

"We have team rules," Gadwa said. "You don't follow them, you don't play. I'll leave it at that. The culture part of it's huge. If we can't get guys to follow simple rules, then how are we going to get them to play a complex hockey game and learn what we want them to learn and, more important, become the type of people we want them to become?"

Pietila opened the scoring just 4:23 into the game when he parked in front of the net and knocked in the rebound of a shot by Ty Kraut.

Kastamo made it 2-0 at the 11:52 mark, but Northville cut the lead in half when Mitch Murdie scored 18 seconds into the second period.

The Eagles (8-3) nursed the one-goal lead for most of the middle stanza until Pietila took an outlet pass from Storm and buried a wrist shot from the right circle with 2:15 left in the second. He got his hat trick 1:39 into the third when he took the puck from the right boards, cut across the zone and scored on a wrist shot from the left circle.

Kyle Janis, one of three junior varsity players brought up for the game, scored his first varsity goal with 9:50 left in the third period. Defenseman Issac Frantti completed the scoring with 5:48 remaining.

Sophomore goalie Brady Hubenschmidt made 17 saves, improving his record to 3-1 while lowering his goals against average to 1.16. Senior Colin Babcock has started Hartland’s biggest games against Detroit Catholic Central, Brighton, Birmingham Brother Rice and Houghton, but the battle to determine the No. 1 goalie for the playoffs is by no means settled.

“That is such a healthy competition at this point,” Gadwa said. “You’ll see Hubenschmidt get some big games this semester, as well. It’s going to be a battle and, obviously, the best guy plays.”

The Mustangs evened up the play after scoring early in the second period, but couldn’t get the equalizer.

“Obviously, you bring it to one goal, you’re feeling pretty good,” Northville coach Ryan Ossenmacher said. “It was definitely not our best effort. That’s a credit to the way Hartland plays; they’re difficult to play against. We didn’t match a lot of what they were doing.”

Northville fell to 5-7-1 as it prepares for its Upper Peninsula trip Friday at Calumet and Saturday at Hancock.

“Our conversation afterward was pretty simple,” Ossenmacher said. “That has to be our worst effort of 2023. If that’s the basement of where we’re at for the rest of the season, then I’m OK with that. If it’s not, then we’re going to have to make some changes with what we’re doing. Guys are working hard in practice. We’re doing things fairly consistently. I just think that right now we’re not applying them consistently enough in games. But it’s a long two months and, at the end of the day, we’re getting ready for the playoffs; that’s the hope.”

Boys basketball

Hartland 55, South Lyon 29

Michael Kilburg scored 17 points and Cyrus Gray had 12 for Hartland (3-4).

Contact Bill Khan at wkhan@gannett.com. Follow him on Twitter @BillKhan.

This article originally appeared on Livingston Daily: Hartland hockey freshman scores 3 goals in win over Northville