Newtown Teammates Help Icehawks Win Hockey Championship

Two Newtown hockey players led their Squirt hockey team over the course of the regular season and throughout their postseason tournament games to help claim a championship title. Newtowners Colby Fowler and Matthias Paltauf play for the Northwestern Icehawks Squirt B team, which is comprised of 9 and 10 year olds. 

They play their home games at both Canterbury and The Gunnery ice rinks in New Milford and Washington. The Newtown teammates finished their 37-game regular season first and second in both total points and goals scored for the team.

This past weekend they helped the Icehawks win the Smyth Division State Championship at the Connecticut Hockey Conference State Tournament in Bolton.

In their first tournament game, on March 9 against the Greater New Haven B team,  the shorthanded Icehawks were beaten in a contest that was closer that the 4-1 final score would indicate. 

Then, on March 12, they played two more games; an early morning matchup versus the CT Northern Lights followed by an early evening game against Wallingford. In the first match against the Northern Lights the team bounced back with a solid 3-0 win. All three goals and the natural hat-trick came off the stick of Paltauf, with Fowler getting one of the assists.

In the next game, versus Wallingford, a tie or better was needed for the team to advance and after a scoreless first period, the Icehawks exploded with a five-goal second period, which proved enough in the 5-0 victory. The first goal, and game-winner, was scored by Matthias and both Colby and Matthias added an assist each.

With their opening round record finishing at 2-1-0, the Icehawks moved on to the semifinal round on March 13, with an early morning semifinal game against a Pawling Squirt B team that made it through undefeated with a record of 3-0, while outscoring opponents by a combined score of 12-6. The Icehawks, however, had another stellar second period, scoring three unanswered goals in a 3-0 victory, ensuring their spot in the championship game later that day.

The Smyth Division State Final game was against the hometown favorite Echo Stars. The Stars had also made it through with a record of 3-1-0, which included beating the only team the Icehawks had lost to in the tournament, the Greater New Haven Warriors, in the semifinals. In this hard-fought final game, however, the Icehawks showed that they didn’t go all the way up to Bolton to finish in second place to the Stars. In the 3-1 victory Fowler notched the first two goals, including the game-winner, both assisted by Paltauf.

In the five tournament games, the Newtown line-mates accounted for 6 of the 15 goals scored, including 3 of the 4 game-winning goals, adding another 5 assists.