Newtown sisters Mia and Marianna Paltauf capped off a long weekend of hockey with a second place finish in the New Jersey Rapid Fire tournament with their Brewster Lady Bulldogs U-12 hockey team earlier in March.

Marianna, 10, despite playing up an age level, battled hard all weekend against bigger opponents and was a force around the opposing net registering multiple scoring chances and keeping the other goalies busy. Mia, 12, took charge and finished the weekend having a hand in five of the seven goals the Lady Bulldogs scored, tallying four goals and an assist.

The Lady Bulldogs were handed a tough schedule with the times of their games. They opened the tournament late Friday evening, March 10, with a 2-0 win over the Skyland Lady Kings (NJ) with Mia netting the game-winning goal after stealing the puck, deking three players and beating the goalie high glove side.

Next up was a March 11 game at 7 am against the Nassau Girls (NJ), and they were shut out despite 28 shots on net. After having the rest of the day off, the girls had yet another 7 am game the next morning coupled with losing an hour with daylight savings kicking in. However, the Lady Bulldogs came out strong with yet another 2-0 victory against the Mighty Moose (Pa) with Mia netting another goal to add to her tally. Next up after a 2 hour break was a 2 pm contest with the Lady Bandits (NJ). Entering the game the Lady Bulldogs knew they not only had to win, but could only allow the Bandits two or less goals or they would lose the tiebreakers and not advance to the championship game later that day. After falling behind 2-0 while being outshot 9-3 in the first 4:24 of play the Lady Bulldogs called a timeout, regrouped, and then fought back to score three unanswered goals while holding the Bandits to just six more shots for the remainder of the game. The Lady Bulldogs went on to win a thrilling 3-2 game to put themselves into the finals later that day. Mia put the team on her back and registered not only the first two goals but finished the game with a perfect tape to tape pass for the primary assist on the game winning goal late in the third period.

This win put them into the championship game versus the undefeated Central Park Lady Hawks (NY) at 5 pm. Central Park, however, only had to play one game earlier that day while the Lady Bulldogs were now faced with a third game in a span of just nine hours. Despite the odds being stacked against them the Lady Bulldogs gave it all that they had left and kept the Lady Hawks off the score sheet for the first period. After that the fatigue started to show they fell behind and lost 4-0 despite a valiant effort.