Last year, Northampton surprised itself with a trip to the Lehigh Valley Scholastic Hockey League (LVSHL) finals.

This season, the Konkrete Kids would have been disappointed without a trip there.

At press time, Northampton trailed Parkland, 1-0, in the best-of-three finals at the Rink at Lehigh Valley by virtue of a 3-1 loss Monday night. Game 2 was scheduled for Wednesday night and a Game 3 would be Friday evening.

The Kids finished tied for second with Phillipsburg in the regular-season LVSHL standings with an overall 11-4-1 mark.

They did defeat Phillipsburg, 3-1, in the opening round of the playoffs to advance to the finals.

“That’s been our goal all season,” said Kids’ head coach Brian Ruff. “We didn’t expect to get there last year. We put extra pressure on ourselves to live up to the expectations, and the guys came through like they should have.”

In their opening game against Parkland, the Kids feel behind 1-0 in the opening eight minutes, but they tied the game when Ethan Davis-Luzer tied it with a power-play goal at 12:09.

Parkland moved ahead, 2-1, with a goal at the 9:36 mark, and the Trojans sealed the game with a goal early in the final period.

Kids’ goalie Noah Smargiassi turned back 40 of the Trojans’ 43 shots.

“Noah (Smargiassi) has been phenomenal all year,” stressed Ruff. “I don’t think anyone would doubt that he is the MVP of our team.”

The Kids managed just 15 shots.

“That was probably the worst game we played all year,” offered Ruff. “It wasn’t a good game for us. I can’t explain it, and it just happens. They came out and played harder than we did.”

Balanced has been one of the Kids’ major keys to success all season. Braden Rychinka is their leading scorer with 15 goals and nine assists for 24 points, followed by Myles Dutt (8-7-15), Alyssa Wruble (2-11-13), Ryan Wruble (10-2-12), Koltan Bates (3-7-10), and Aidan Carey (6-4-10), all of whom are in double digits.

“We don’t have anybody in the top 10 in scoring in the league, but we probably have more in the top 20 than any other team,” said Ruff. “Our scoring has been spread out all season. Everybody plays their roles and it has helped.”

Ruff was confident that history can repeat itself after their Game One loss to Parkland.

“We always have come back and played well after a bad game this season,” stated Ruff. “We lost the first game of the finals last year and came back and won the next.

“We’ll see what happens.”