Mar
10

Knights Finish in Top Four in NAPHA League

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The Rice Knights belong to the league called the North American Prep Hockey Association, which is comprised of 9 teams from all over the north east, US and Canada. They compete each year and have had the talent to finish towards the top for many years. This year the Knights went into the league championship weekend seated in 7th place, again not that greatest seed. They faced the 2015 league champions Nichols School.

Heading into the game the Knights had tied Nichols 0-0 and lost to them 4-1 in regular season play, so again the Knights knew they had a chance for a great game. With another up and down the ice game Jillian Gibbs took the puck off a Nichols player stick in the Rice defensive zone, split the 2 defense on the blue line and away she went on a break away, Gibbs dropped shoulder and shot with her backhand over the goalies blocker to make the game 1-0 Rice early in the 1st period. The game continued as it was a very tight game for both teams and the knights battled to earn the 1-0 victory to send them into the Semi finals for the first time in the programs history. Although the Knights battled hard for the next 2 games luck wasn’t on their side and they finished the 2015-16 NAPHA league with a 4th place finish.