High School Ice Hockey: Eastern Survives, Barely, Against Holy Cross Monday, December 15, 2003 By Mike Costantino SJSports Staff Writer Chris Ball had two goals as Eastern held off a determined and under-manned Holy Cross team 5-4 in Tier 1 action at the Skate Zone on Monday evening. AJ Kirschner paced Holy Cross with two goals. Coming into the game not many people gave Holy Cross a chance. Near the bottom in the standings and only dressing eleven players, Holy Cross gave Eastern all they could handle and had the Vikings hanging on at the end. Eastern led 2-0 after the first period on goals by Ball and Sean Sullivan. Holy Cross tied the game in the first four minutes of the second period as goals by Kirschner and Neal Krause erased the Eastern lead. However, Eastern was able to capitalize on the power play as Joey Johnston scored with assists to Brandon Tunstall and Anthony Orner. When Ball scored his second goal to give Eastern some breathing room at 4-2, you thought, okay here is where fatigue will kick in and Holy Cross will start to fade. Nevertheless, Kirschner scored just fifty seconds later to cut the lead to 4-3 heading into the third period. With the game in the balance, both teams spent the first ten minutes of the period killing off penalties, as they evenly divided eight. Then with the penalty boxes finally empty, Dan Tavana scored with less than five minutes left in the game to put Eastern up 5-3 and Pat Tamez got that back for Holy Cross with less than three minutes left to make it 5-4. Although they could not get the equalizer, if they continue to give that kind of effort, more wins will come their way, and possibly just a few more players. Photos by Art Redd

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