Olentangy Orange, which hails from Lewis Center, Ohio in Delaware County, made the trip to Serpentini Arena at Winterhurst on Friday evening and improved its record to 9-2-1.
Saint Ignatius, ranked No. 1 in this week's coaches state poll, will now take a 12-2-4 mark into Saturday's second round match up with defending state champion Shaker Heights. The puck will drop on the Winterhurst ice at 11:50 AM.
Lakewood Heights Boulevard - Saint Ignatius' highly successful head hockey coach Pat O'Rourke '90 was quick to credit the performance by Olentangy Orange goalie Cam Beck and also didn't hesitate to point the finger at himself after his Ice Cats lost for just the second time in 18 games this young season, 2-1.
"He's a very good goalie," Coach O'Rourke said of Beck after the Pioneers' junior keeper stood up to 43 of the 44 shots fired at him off the Winterhurst ice during Friday evening's opening round of the St. Edward Eagle Classic. "But I don't think we were ready to play, and that's my fault.
"We were a little loosey goosey in the first period and then we picked it up, I thought, in the second period," Coach O'Rourke continued. "You have to come ready to play every night. Every team that plays us, it's like their Super Bowl. We need to understand that. I don't think we were ready tonight, and it hurt us."
Olentangy Orange, which advanced to the state final four in 2012, and Saint Ignatius, a state champion in 2000 and 2010 that has made five final four appearances, exchanged first period goals.
Gifted junior forward Matty Geither did the honors for the Ice Cats off an assist from senior captain and defenseman Harry Smith with 9 minutes and 2 seconds remaining in the first 15 minutes. The Pioneers tied it on a goal by active junior forward Brandon Voytus at 5:46.
The second period saw Beck and Wildcats sophomore goalie Dylan McKeon rise to every occasion, as Beck's dive-to-the-ice smothering save and quick reaction against a Saint Ignatius 1-on-1 opportunity kept it a tie game entering the final 15 minutes.
With both teams displaying the ability to kill off penalties throughout the night, the Pioneers of Coach Tim Pennington stayed on the right path and scored the winning goal off an authoritative top-shelf slap shot by junior defenseman Cole Essig with less than three minutes gone in the third period.
Beck then withstood some late flurries by the Ice Cats and the celebration was on for a school that opened in August of 2008.
"We got a lot of shots (44 to 19), yeah, but he (Beck) made some good saves and we hit the glass a few times, which is sort of being wasteful about some opportunities," said Coach O'Rourke. "You have to learn those lessons. So if we learned a lesson from it, then that's okay. The most important lesson is being ready to play every day.
"You have to understand what it means to play for this school," Coach O'Rourke continued. "For them (Olentangy Orange) it's a nice victory. Luckily we get to come back tomorrow and try to right those wrongs. One thing about our program is that we point to March (the state tournament). So the bottom line is that if we take those lessons to heart, we'll get better. If we don't, we'll probably show up and lose again tomorrow. We'll see how we respond."