Photos and story By Janet Schultz, NYHOL;
Looking ahead to the New Year Lancaster/Iroquois/Depew/Alden are going to be fighting a good fight to stay in first place in both the League and the Section. With two private schools playing, St. Mary’s of Lancaster and Monsignor Martin, there are two sets of stats. The privates are part of the league but not part of Section VI.
St. Mary’s of Lancaster sits in second place in the League; followed by Hamburg/Elma/West Seneca; Clarence/Amherst/Sweethome; Kenmore/Grand Island/Lockport; Frontier/Orchard Park (no one from Lakeshore this season); Williamsville; Niagara County and Monsignor Martin.
In Section VI, HEWS, CASH, KengiPort, FOP, Williamsvilleand NiCo follow LIDA.
Leading the scoring for the League is KengiPort’s Teagan Willates with 7 goals and 8 assists for 15 points. Right behind her is LIDA’s Leah Dowling with 7 goals and 7 assists. Sabrina Basamania (FOP) sits at third with 3 goals and 7 assists. Fourth place is all tied up with 9 points each by Emily Lysiak (LIDA) 4 goals/5 assists; Brynn Gafferty (LIDA), 5 goals/4 assists; Caitlin Sinclair (LIDA) 2 goals/7 assists; Avery Szczesek (St. Marys of Lancaster) 7 goals/2 assists and Madelyn Jagow (KengiPort) 3 goals/6 assists. (All stats are as of December 18 2025)
CASH’s Ella Celej has been making key saves for CASH and sits with a 4-2 record and one shutout putting her at the top of the Goalie statistics. She has played 269.42 minutes with a .932 save percentage and 1.84 gaa after making 151 saves of 162 shots.
Kate Kelley of Monsignor Martin has logged 185 minutes facing 157 shots and making 144 saves for a .917 save percentage and 3.16 gaa.
Ella Buczynski has made 105 shots on 115 attempts for HEWS giving her a .913 save percentage after 222.67 minutes between the pipes. She has a 3-2-0 record with one shutout.
Anna Maki of LIDA appeared in the net for 45 minutes but sotpped 10 of 11 shotws for a .909 save percentage and 1.00 gaa in a win.
Eighth grader Sophia Hathaway has logged 134.55 minutes for Williamsville, stoped 121 of 134 shots for a .903 save percentage and .435 gaa.
Betsy Accurso has logged the most minutes between the pipes with 270 minutes. In that tie she has won 5 games, lost one and had one shutout. She has a .895 save percentage and 1.67 gaa. She also has had the most wins as a goalie.
Celej, Buczynski, Accurso and Schimenti have each had one shutout this season.
Sam Latini of NICO sits at ninth on the All Time Scoring Leader List with 87 goals and 58 assists in 87 games played. She is the only active player on that list at this time. However on the radar from this season are Willats, Smaczniak, Lysiak, Phillips and Peyton Forcucci.
The League always has something throw it a curve that postpones games. This year has been sickness, weather and a leaking roof.
The NICO at CASH December 11 game has been rescheduled for December 22 at 3:30 p.m. at Northtown.
LIDA will play NICO on December 29 at 3 p.m. at Riverworks to make up for the December 18 postponed game.
The LIDA vs FOP game on December 11 was postponed until December 31 at 9 a.m. at Leisure Rinks.
December 4 game with NICO versus FLOP rescheduled for January 13 at 4 p.m. at Dwyer Arena.
St. Mary’s postponed an early December game with NICO and that will be played Monday, January 19 at 2 p.m. at Northtown aena.
Other games postponed and not yet rescheduled are Monsignor Martin at LIDA at Holiday from December 16 and HEWS at Monsignor Martin from December 18 (leaky roof).
In other WNYGVIH news and notes:
This year’s Nut Bowl went to HEWS with a 3-0 victory over CASH. (CASHEWS) Kylie Wegrzynowski with the game winning goal on the powerplay.
16th season opened with a 8-6 win for Williamsville over NICO. Genevieve Illos of Williamsville and Sam Latini of NICO both had hattricks plus one goal in that game.
Hattricks so far this year: Leah Dowling (LIDA), Avery Szczesek (St. Marys of Lancaster), Kiley Breeze (CASH), Brynn Cafferty (LIDA), Mia Hauser (LIDA), Erin Krawczyk (KenGiPort).
Erin Krawczyk of KengiPort had all 4 goals in the 4-1 win over Williamsville. In that game Williamsville’s Illos scored 30 seconds into the game for Williamsville’s only goal of the night.
We would like to congratulate CASH’s Jenny Wild on her commitment to SUNY Plattsburgh and former LIDA player Caydon Kowalow commitment to Northeastern University.
Please note all statistics are as of December 20, 2025. There are still a few games to be played in the 2025 year. All teams return to the ice the week of January 5.
Monday, January 5: Williamsville at St.Marys of Lancaster; NICO at HEWS.
Tuesday,January 6: CASH at NICO; HEWS at LIDA; MonMar at KenGiPort
Wednesday, January 7: FOP at MonMar
Thursday, January 8: Williamsville at FOP; St. Marys at CASH and NICO at MonMar
For complete scheduled go to