By Ryan Mink
rmink@digitalsports.com

In what could have been David Mann’s final high school hockey game, in front of his home crowd and against his rival in the IAC championship.

“You couldn’t ask for a better game,” Mann said of Thursday's contest against Georgetown Prep.

Mann did he make the most of it, netting a hat trick as a defense man to lead Landon to a 5-4 win over Georgetown Prep in the IAC championship game.

With the win, Landon earned a share of the conference’s overall title.

Georgetown Prep (14-5-1) beat Landon (17-5-1) in their first regular season meeting, then the teams tied when meeting a second time. That meant Landon, who shared last year’s IAC title with Bullis and St. Stephen’s & St. Agnes, could earn only another share Thursday in Rockville.

“This game really showed we are the better team,” said Mann, who scored three straight goals for the Bears.

“Personally, we think we’re champs,” added Landon sophomore goalie Jake Soffer “We won the main game.”

Mann scored Landon’s second goal just three minutes, 20 seconds after the first. Prep retorted 1:33 later before Mann struck again, scoring his second goal with a long-range shot from the middle of the rink. Then, he still had one more up his sleeve.

“How perfect?” Landon Coach Chandler Gammill said. “Our captain nailing home those goals -- I just couldn’t hope for anything better.”

It was Landon’s third goal on its fourth shot of the game and forced Georgetown Prep freshman goalie out of the game at 6:43.

Soffer, on the other hand, was spectacular, saving 17 shots overall. Fellow sophomore Sam Anas scored Landon’s final goal with seven minutes, 24 seconds left in the game, which proved to be the game-winner considering the Little Hoyas pulled to within one just more than a minute later.

But it was perhaps junior Will Korengold’s goal just 16 seconds into the game that did the most damage. Senior forward Charles Gage took a long slapper that bounced off Little Hoyas freshman goalie Bruce Racine. Korengold followed the shot and stuffed it in.

“We hadn’t seen anything like that our whole season,” said Prep’s Devin Drewyer, who notched a goal and assist.

Prep, who was attempting to win its first outright IAC championship in program history, scored two of the  next three goals, by Drewyer and Patrick Hall to pull to within just one goal behind entering the third period.

Landon, who was coming off an overtime shootout win over Bullis, pulled together, though and fended off Georgetown Prep’s advances until they were streaming onto the ice in celebration.

“I think our boys believed in themselves and their teams and their line mates,” Gammill said. “It would have been great not to share it, but to get a piece of it is pretty darn good.”