(Walpole, MA) -- The weekend was marked by suffocating offense, exceptional goaltending and, for a few periods in a Junior A game, undisciplined play that resulted in a loss.

Junior A Wrap-Up
On Saturday, the A team topped the Portland Jr. Pirates 3-0, first by taking advantage of two power play opportunities on goals by Adam Korol and Charles LaChance, and then by preserving the lead through excellent goaltending by Rich Stine. Matt Harrington added Walpole’s final goal while Steve Charest and Lou Malvasi each added two assists. Stine made 28 saves for the shutout.

Things didn’t go as smoothly on Sunday. In a penalty filled game the Express were unable to hold off the Portland power play, which netted three goals with the man advantage. Though the Express jumped out to an early 1-0 lead on a goal by Eric Vos, Portland capitalized on the Express’ increasingly undisciplined play. The Pirates scored three unanswered goals and held a 3-1 lead after two periods. Walpole battled back shrinking the gap to one but Portland goalie Carl Rappa held strong to give Portland the 3-2 win.

“Overall, we played well throughout the weekend --even in the loss today,” said Head Coach Mark Kumpel. “Obviously, we needed to be more disciplined on Sunday and do a better job killing penalties. That’s something we’ll work on this week in preparation for upcoming games against the Bulldogs and Cyclones.”

Junior B Wrap-Up
Will Harrop lead the way for the Express’s 6-0 victory over the Troy Eagles with two goals and two assists. Jordan John scored early in the first period and the Express opened up the lead in the second with Harrop’s first goal and a late period tally by Dan Bufis to put the score at 3-0. In the third, the Express took advantage of two power plays opportunities with Harrop adding his second goal and Georgiy Gurianov contributing one, as well. Dan Bufis scored his second late in the game. Zach Andrews made 24 saves for the win in net.

On Sunday, the Express gave a scoring clinic on the way to a 12 -0 victory. Walpole jumped all over Troy from the opening shift scoring five times in the first period on goals by Joobin Mozaffarimehr, Jordan Fragoza, Harrop, Shaun Gould and John. The second period was more of the same as the Express ran Troy goalie Matt Crescione from the game and scored three more times, two by Gurianov and the first of two by Jake Domos. In the third, the Express peppered the Troy net and found the back of it four more times as Domos added his second. Also scoring were Jason Methot, defenseman Jide Idowu and Elliot Bock. Joe Gladnick stopped all 13 shots he faced for the Express’ second shutout of the weekend.

“Offensively we did a good job but that all starts with what we do in our zone,” explained Head Coach Tony Dalessio. “Our goaltending has been, and was again this weekend, top notch. In my opinion, we have two All-Star goaltenders and we played great in the defensive zone. When we play like that we have four lines of suffocating offense that is tough to beat.”

Upcoming Games
This week the Junior A team will have a pair of weekday games. On Wednesday, Nov. 19 the team will make the first of three trips to Hudson, NH to take on the Northern Cyclones, and on Friday, Nov. 21 the Express host the Boston Bulldogs at Iorio Arena. The puck drops at 8:40 pm. The Junior B team will again face the Troy Eagles, this time at Knickerbocker Arena in Troy, N.Y. on Saturday and Sunday.