The Ridge Red Devils hockey team shut out the Watchung Hills Warriors on Wednesday evening, winning 3-0. Ridge goalie Alec Wells had 19 saves in the game.

Neither team scored in the first period, and early in the game Watchung Hills seemed to be in control. The Warriors got off the most shots early in the first period, but when a penalty against Watchung Hills gave Ridge a power play, that trend was reversed.

The Red Devils could not score during the power play, but neither could Watchung Hills on their power play that followed, a result of a penalty against Eric Von der Linde of Ridge.

Ridge's goalie, Wells, made 5 saves during the Watchung Hills power play to keep the game even going into the second period. The game was close: Ridge had 10 shots in the first period and Watchung Hills had eight.

The second period was different. The Red Devils had scored two goals within the first four minutes of the period and were clearly dominating, both out-shooting and out-scoring the Warriors.

Senior Joe Madden scored the first goal for Ridge 2:24 into the second period with assists from Nigel Wardrop and Matt Burnett.

"It felt really good to score. I'm having a rough year, so hopefully I'm breaking out of a slump," said Madden.

Ridge's second goal came 1:29 seconds after the first, this time during a Red Devils power play. Keith Knapp scored for the Red Devils on the rebound of a shot to bring Ridge up 2-0.

Ridge had nine shots in the second period while Watchung Hills was held to four. In the third period, however, the Warriors began to take more shots and were given many opportunities to score. The Red Devils kept committing penalties, giving Watchung Hills three power plays during the third period.

The Warriors took five shots on goal during the first five minutes of the third period, but could not find a way to get the puck past Wells. During Watchung Hills' first two power plays of the period, the result of penalties against Madden and Derek Vogt, they could did not get a single shot off. In fact, the only shot taken during those power plays was one from Ridge.

At one point, Ridge defender Peyton Lynn smartly trapped a Warriors offender against the glass, and allowed the clock to run down while the puck was stuck between the players' legs and sticks.

The third and final power play of the third period for the Warriors turned out even worse for them than the first two.

With 2:12 left in the game a penalty against Von der Linde put Ridge one man down. Watchung Hills decided to pull their goalie to create more of an offensive threat, but their plan backfired when Jake Hotz stole the puck and flew down the rink, shooting into an open net from the middle of the ice to score Ridge's third and final goal.

The shut out was Wells' second of the year.

"Today was a good day," he said as he came off the ice.

The next Ridge Ice Hockey game will be on Friday against Hillsborough at 6:30 p.m. and will be played at Protechockey in Somerset.