TINTON FALLS – There will be 15 girls ice hockey teams competing across New Jersey this winter, up from 13 teams last season and 11 in the previous year. But there is only one program in the Shore participating in the emerging niche: Trinity Hall.
“Our senior class has six hockey players,” said head coach Frankie Francese. “I think only two of them have played at the club level. The other four came in as freshmen, actually three came in as freshmen having never played ice hockey.”
That blend of different experience levels, combined with a daunting schedule of practices and games, could be considered an obstacle.
For the Monarchs, it’s an opportunity.
Trinity Hall is the only all-girls high school at the Shore and became a member of the Shore Conference in 2015. And players on the hockey team are in a class by themselves, embarking on hockey’s new frontier; their commitment level equals or surpasses that of any ice hockey program in the area. To get ice time, the team must hold practices at 6 a.m. every morning. A differentiator is the significant amount of players who not only don’t play travel hockey, but also those who had never played ice hockey at any level before joining the team.
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“These girls are up before 5 (in the morning) and at the rink by 5:30. That starts building the culture right there,” said Francese. “Bus ride trips to go play the North Jersey teams, we take that bus ride as an opportunity to build culture again.”
Coming off a 7-10-2 campaign, the efforts to build that culture paid dividends at the end of last season. The Monarchs won their state playoff opener against Chatham before narrowly losing 2-1 to eventual state champ Morristown-Beard, which has won both state titles since the NJSIAA first introduced the postseason tournament two years ago. It’s those kinds of performances that has Francese optimistic about the coming season.
“If we can get that offensive production out of the players that are on the roster now, I think we have a very strong shot at competing for (state titles),” he said. “We constantly want to gauge where we are in the state of New Jersey with our program. So if you want to do that, you’ve got to play the best teams.”
Defensive foundation key as Trinity looks to replace offensive production
Francese alluded to offensive production being the key question that needs to be answered for Trinity Hall to have a breakthrough season. The Monarchs will need…
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