It wasn’t pretty, but it wasn’t dull.

Much of Friday night’s game between host Fenwick and Carmel was a chaotic slugfest, as 14 combined penalties can attest. Both teams also had to mount comeback efforts in regulation before a 2-2 tie went to overtime and then a shootout.

One shootout conversion from Max Vavra on a nifty backhand later, and Carmel had effectively wrapped up the win.

Carmel’s last three SHL results have uplifted the Corsairs; a 4-3 win over Saint Viator,, and a 4-3 overtime loss to top-ranked Loyola just 24 hours prior to Friday’s  comeback on tired legs to win on Fenwick’s home ice.

“It gets us pumped. We feel amazing right now,” Carmel defenseman Ben Vavra said. “At the start of the season we didn’t know where we were going to be but after those two games and then pulling this (comeback) off, it just feels amazing.”

Among its last five SHL games, Carmel (9-11-0, 3-6-0 in SHL play) also came back from a 2-0 deficit with two goals in the second period to tie Glenbrook North before losing 3-2.

One night after a lop-sided loss to Glenbrook South last Saturday, Carmel rebounded Sunday with its 4-3 win over Saint Viator.

Carmel coach PJ Eberhardt’s youth movement is slowly shedding that youth.

“It’s a young team but the guys are finding it,” Eberhardt said. “They’re learning how to play at this level and what it takes to play in the SHL.”

That learning curve is also taking place for Fenwick. The Friars outshot both Carmel and Stevenson in thier last two SHL games, both in losses.

Fenwick’s first period play Friday against Carmel was exceptional, as the Friars earned an 11-5 edge in shots and forced Carmel goalie Gavin Stanley to make several quality saves.

Harrison Sramek, Giovanni Sena, Joe Krzak, Mike Verni, and Dominic Fosco all put pucks on net through the 10th minute of play, but Stanley kept the lid on.

Fenwick took a 1-0 lead on a 5-on-3 power play with only 1:06 remaining in the first period. Demetri Karabatsos fired from the high slot into a crowded goalmouth, and teammate Mikey Curtin got his stick on it to re-direct it into net for his first SHL goal of the season.

And with Fenwick goalie Spencer Lisek staying solid in stopping a handful of scoring chances on Carmel breakouts, the Friars were sitting in a good place.

“We did a very good job in the first period of playing below their goal line,” Fenwick coach Nick Fabbrini said. “That’s something we talk about a lot, staying on their end and not just throwing pucks away down there, but possessing and looking to make plays below the goal line, whether that’s finding guys in the slot, or going low-to-high and using the D. That’s something I thought we did a really good job of in the first seventeen minutes.

“But then we kind of got away from it. We got sloppy and kind of casual with the puck. We’re still trying to figure out how to play a full, fifty-one minute game.”

Fenwick (5-14-0, 0-13-0) withstood a second period that saw Carmel post a 10-5 edge in shots. Lisek turned away a pair of scoring chances from Carmel’s Lincoln Stochl roughly four minutes into the period, just prior to one of the game’s pivotal moments.

Fenwick was awarded a penalty shot when Alex Matysiak was taken down from behind on a breakaway with 10 minutes remaining in the period. The left-handed Matysiak skated up the right side, faked, and cut across in front of Stanley on the penalty shot, but Stanley moved to his right to follow Matysiak before the Fenwick senior sent his shot just wide.

Carmel went on the power play mid-way through the second period but Fenwick’s penalty kill didn’t give up a shot. Stanley gloved a shot from the point on the left side taken by Fenwick’s Jake Alessi, and Lisek turned away a shot from Carmel’s Rocco Falco from mid-slot soon thereafter.

The final five minutes of the second period were pure mayhem, with each team committing three penalties apiece that overlapped to created one- and two-man advantages both ways until the buzzer ended the second period.

Carmel saw its chance to tie the game on the power play go awry, while Fenwick saw its chance to increase its lead fall by the wayside.

“It’s not for a lack of chances; it’s scoring that next goal,” Fabbrini said. “When you’re scoring a goal or two a game, there’s not a lot of margin for error. When you’re not getting that second or third goal, you’re leaving yourself susceptible, and (Carmel) hung around long enough and made some really good plays in the third.”

With his squad chasing a one-goal deficit at intermission, Eberhardt had a clear message to his team.

“Basically coach just came in there and said ‘boys, this is not how we play hockey’,” Carmel’s Deacon Rose said. “We were getting a lot of penalties, not playing our game. He told us ‘stick to your game because you’re better than this’. 

“Especially after an overtime game last night, the team was a little fatigued. But we got the legs going into the third and into overtime.”

Fenwick’s Karabatsos, Verni, and Curtin applied solid pressure below the Carmel goal line to start the third period but came up empty against Stanley. Little more than four minutes into the period, Carmel found its equalizer.

Rose intercepted a puck deep in Carmel’s offensive end, took it left to right across the slot, and buried a wrist shot, It was Rose’s third SHL goal of the year, tying the game at 1-1 with 12:42 remaining in the game.

Lisek made a fine save on a Stochl breakaway shot a minute later, and the teams traded successful penalty kills over the game’s next five minutes.

Carmel found a go-ahead goal with 5:46 left in the game. Lisek deflected an Aidan Gammel shot from the right side out of play, setting up a draw on the right side.

Carmel won the draw, the puck squirted quickly to Gammel, and this time he didn’t miss, burying his shot from the right side near the top of the circle.

“We battled through the adversity,” Rose said. “We were down 1-0 for the majority of the game but we found a way to bury it in the net, take the lead, and pressure them.”

Fenwick wasn’t finished. The waning moments of the game kept to its chaotic script. Verni hit a post with a shot and Stanley turned away a slap shot from the point soon thereafter, off the stick of Fenwick’s Christopher Godellas

Fenwick went on the power play and Stanley stopped a Sena shot from mid-slot with just over a minute remaining. The Friars pulled Lisek to gain a numbers advantage in the final minute, and it paid off when Verni hammered in the equalizer at the post in a crowd, with only 11 seconds left in the game.

A scoreless five minutes of 3-on-3 overtime hockey ensued, setting up Max Vavra’s shootout goal. Prior to Verni’s late tying goal, Vavra had nearly secured the win in regulation, firing nearly the length of the ice to an empty Fenwick net, only to see it hit the post.

The right-handed Vavra didn’t miss his second chance to be a hero, skating up in the shootout and converting on a backhand shot. Fenwick’s subsequent shootout try went wide of net to give Carmel two points in the standings.

Afterwards, Eberhardt was proud of the character his boys showed at the end of two grueling nights of hockey.

“We had no legs coming off the Loyola game,” Eberhardt said. “You could see the heaviness. But they came to play in the third.”

“They’re learning that things that worked at lower levels aren’t going to work here because the SHL is so competitive. So you have to be willing to change and play not a more predictable game, but defensively you need to be predictable. You need to play with structure because if you freelance, your team pays the price. But they’re improving and if we continue on this path, we’ll be just fine.”

Eberhardt applauded the play of Stanley in net, and “I thought my best line was (Josh) Braus, (Lincoln) Stochl, and Jaxson Dick,” Eberhardt said. “They battled. They won their races, won their shifts, and won territory throughout the game and we needed that from them.”

Ben Vavra sees more dedication and chemistry taking root since Carmel’s rocky early-season play.

“We have to keep the momentum going and we have to focus on our defense, because we tend to let a lot of people come into the house,” Vavra said. “We have to keep our heads on swivels and keep playing unselfish hockey.”

Fenwick had a good number of players who shined despite the loss.

“I thought the line of (William) Pabst, (Giovanni) Sena, and (Dominic) Fosco played well,” Fabbrini said. “I thought Mikey Curtin and (Mike) Verni were really good tonight, Alex Matysiak was good, and Spencer (Lisek) played well. He made some good saves for us and we needed him to.”

Fenwick gets right back into SHL action with a game Sunday at Glenbrook North, in pursuit of its first league victory.

“We knew (the SHL) wasn’t going to be all butterflies and rainbows. There were going to be ups and downs,” Fabbrini said. “But we were just hoping for a few more ups at this point. But it’s really just coming down to a handful of plays in each game that other teams are making and we’re not.

“It’s not a lack of effort, it comes down to execution. But we’ll get there as long as we keep working on the right things and approaching practice the right way. We’ll get over the hump. We just have to execute.”