GLOUCESTER — It was a bit like stepping back in time 25-30 years ago at the Talbot Rink Saturday night.
A packed house of nearly 1,600 raucous hockey fans jammed the old barn on opening night of the 2025-06 season, with arch rivals Danvers and Gloucester — who staged so many classic battles on this same ice surface before full houses in the 1990s and into the 21st century — battling it out. The emotional ceremony preceding the contest, in which the life of the late GHS hockey captain Chris Dailey was remembered, only heightened the big-game feel of this contest.
Tied after two, the visiting Falcons came out and scored four times on just eight shots in the third period to take a 5-2 win — their first over the Fishermen in seven seasons.
“This was a big step forward for our program,” noted second-year Danvers head coach Bill Sheehan. “Our identity is that we want to be the strongest third period team in the (Northeastern) Conference, and tonight that showed.”
Senior wing Cooper Dunham, who had a pair of third period tallies, gave DHS the lead for good just under four minutes into the final stanza when he swept across the front of the crease and tucked a shot past Gloucester netminder Trey Marrone (18 saves).
Just 19 seconds later, Gaven Cooper gave his squad a two-goal lead by getting a wrister just under Marrone’s arm off a scrum out front. Dunham then scored directly off a faceoff, and suddenly it was 4-1 Danvers.
“I’ve had really good luck here in the past; it’s like a switched gets turned on for me,” said Cooper, who has seven goals over the last three seasons at Talbot Rink. “But we didn’t win those (previous games), so it didn’t mean as much. Tonight, though, I’d be racing for the puck and thinking about the guys in our locker room, and even some of our coaches, who had never beaten Gloucester before, and that I could do something to change it. You can’t not take advantage of that.”
Making his first varsity start for Danvers after spending last year at Bishop Fenwick, goaltender Evan Morey got the win with 22 saves.
Gloucester, which had 13 of its 24 total shots on goal in the third period, got some momentum back after highly touted freshman Bryce Albano banged a rebound home with a shade under five minutes left. But Morey shut the door from there, caught a break when GHS missed a potential open net, and watched as captain Thomas Fish iced the win with an empty netter.
“I just told myself, ‘Put the game away here’,” recalled Fish.
The Fishermen had difficulty making plays on both bluelines. Defensively they weren’t able to chip pucks out of their zone with strength and made turnovers by trying to stickhandle instead of dumping the disc. Offensively, they were slow with their decisions and again tried to stickhandle their way to freedom, only to lose the puck — most crucially on Danvers’ third goal.
“It was almost set up to be ‘Who’s going to blink first?’, but we got on the wrong side of that and one goal against turned into three in an avalanche,” said head coach Derek Geary. “We made mistakes that cost us dearly, and Danvers stepped up to the plate when we did.
“I think entering the third period tied and with such emotion for both teams at hand, I can see why one goal led to three. They got that charged they needed, and our guys didn’t rebound quickly enough after that 2-1 deficit. We lost a little of our team identity.”
Captain Drew Godfried, a defenseman, gave Danvers a 1-0 lead in the first period when his seeing-eye shot went in.
“Unreal feeling scoring that first goal of the season,” Godfried admitted. “I heard that crowd pop and just blacked out.”
The Fishermen tied it in the second on a Jackson Harnish goal, where he finished off a 2-on-1 with sophomore Reis LoPiccolo by going to the net with authority.
Danvers 5, Gloucester 2
at Talbot Rink, Gloucester
Danvers;1;0;4;5
Gloucester;0;1;1;2
First period: D, Drew Godfried (Colby Medeiros, Cooper Dunham), 6:31.
Second period: G, Jackson Harnish (Reis LoPiccolo), 2:46.
Third period: D, Dunham (Jacob Langlais, Aiden Hockney), 3:56; D, Gaven Cooper (Thomas Fish), D, Dunham (un), 6:32; G, Bryce Albano (Will Linn, Lukas Albano), 10:07; D, Fish (un), eng, 13:26.
Saves: D, Evan Morey 22; G, Trey Marrone 18.
Records: D, 1-0; G, 0-1.