Phillylacrosse.com, Posted 12/3/23 – From Press Release
Blaze Riorden scored four goals, Mitch Jones had two goals and six assists and Joe Resetarits dished five assists while Zach Higgons posted 49 saves and an assist in goal Saturday night as the Philadelphia Wings opened the 2023024 season with a 13-10 win over the host New York Riptide at the Nassau County Coliseum.
The Wings jumped out to an early lead after newly acquired Holden Cattoni scored his first goal in a Wings jersey just over a minute and a half into the game. In goal, Zach Higgins began his 2023-2024 season on fire, not allowing just one goal in the first quarter.
After one quarter of play, Philadelphia held a 3-0 lead after getting scores from three different players. The Wings got another goal from Sammy LeClair to go up 4-0 just two minutes into the second quarter. Mitch Jones scored his first goal of the season with just under nine minutes left in the first half to make it 5-0. Jay Thorimbert answered and got the Riptide on the board off the ensuing faceoff.
Connor Kearnan got his first off the year a minute later off a feed from Jeff Teat to make it 5-2. Just over a minute after that, Cattoni stopped the Riptide run with his second goal of the game. Mitch Wilde answered Cattoni’s goal with 5 minutes to go in the 2nd quarter, quickly followed by Connor Kearnan’s first of the season to pull the Riptide back to within 6-4. The Riptide got one more goal before half from Damon Edwards to cap a 5-2 run to close the quarter.
Riorden started the second half with a highlight reel goal to put the Wings back up by two. After a Philadelphia penalty, Riorden completed his hat trick scoring a shorthanded goal to put the Wings up 8-5. Jeff Teat scored his first goal of the new season, but the third quarter continued to be all Wings as Alex Pace extended the lead back to three. With six minutes left in the quarter, former Wing Kiel Matisz put a stop to the run, scoring his first goal in a Riptide uniform. Ben Macintosh (Drexel) notched his second of the game a minute later to put the Wings back up by three goals.
Matisz scored his second goal to bring the Riptide within 10-8. However, Mitch Jones was quick to answer with his second goal of the game to get the Wings’ lead back to 11-8. After a Philly score in transition by Mike McCannell, Larson Sundown scored on the Powerplay for the Riptide and brought New York back to within three goals. Less than a minute later, Riorden scored his fourth goal off a feed from Jones to put the game out of reach.
