WOBURN — First-year Medfield boys hockey coach Jonathan Jepson didn’t know what to expect coming into this season.

Suffice to say, his Warriors have exceed expectations.

On Thursday at O’Brien Rink, Charlie Duggan turned in a 16-save shutout as goals from Joey Nee and John Shaughnessy propelled the second seed to its 21st win in 23 games with a 2-0 blanking of No. 7 Melrose during Division 3 action.

“Charlie is really something. He’s a big game player,” Jepson said. “He’s one of the huge reasons why we are here.”

The Warriors (21-1-1) didn’t get a lot of quality scoring chances against Melrose netminder Matthew Fuccione but they kept putting pucks on the Red Raiders’ goal time after time but had nothing to show for it for nearly half the game. In fact, it was Melrose (12-10-1) which had the better scoring chances in the opening portion, but Duggan came up with several clutch stops.

A tripping penalty on Jack Feeney gave Medfield its first power play and the Warriors’ persistence was handsomely rewarded. Fuccione made two stops in close but Joey Nee got to a third rebound and was able to shovel it past the fallen netminder at 6:27. Melrose nearly got the game deadlocked late in the period but Robert Pino’s bid at the top of the crease was smothered by Duggan.

“We just had to keep chipping away,” Jepson said. “Their goalie made a lot of saves look easy but we stayed positive.”

Melrose got another chance to is the game early in the third but Duggan made a slick glove save on Charlie Hoskins’ bid from the high slot. Just over three minutes later, a scramble in front of the Melrose net saw the puck wind up on the tape of Shaughnessy, who didn’t miss from point blank range for a 2-0 lead with just under 10 minutes left.

The Medfield defense did the rest as it held Melrose to only three shots in the third
period.