It was a great start to a new hockey season Friday night for sophomore forward Tyler Haydu and his Livonia Churchill teammates.

Haydu led the way with three points as the Chargers opened with a 4-0 win over Farmington Hills Unified in the annual Metro High School Invitational.

It was the first high school game for Haydu, a former travel player and champion with Belle Tire who had a goal and two assists at Novi Ice Arena.

“I’m very happy to get the first win under our belts,” Haydu said. “Hopefully, we can get a lot more like that, and I can keep getting points.”

Churchill controlled the puck for a good part of the game and kept the pressure on the Unified defense and goalie Thomas Bacon.

John Doyle and Jordan Venegoni each had one goal and one assist for the Chargers, who led 2-0 after one period.

“We were passing the puck and moving our feet,” Haydu said. “We had some good puck movement and were getting a lot of shots on net. We didn’t want to let up too much. We didn’t want to let them back in the game.

“We wanted to make sure they didn’t get any goals back on us and we got that shutout for our goalie (junior Andrew Broyles).”

Two in the first

Vengoni opened the scoring five minutes into the game, with help from Haydu and Doyle.

Churchill got a big goal from senior Nolan Cioch with just 1:05 remaining in the first period to make it 2-0.

“I think it was a good ending to that period, because it was a reminder we needed to refocus once we came back in the locker room and try to have an even better second period,” Churchill coach Jason Reynolds said. “In years past, we’ve had some issues with that second-period slump. We’ve really come in focused this year. We need to make every period count and play right to the end.

“They could have taken the rest of that minute-five off and they didn’t. They kept playing and it paid off for us.”

Senior leads line

Reynolds had praise for the line consisting of Cioch, Conor Burdette and Josh Friend, who assisted on the goal.

“Nolan is a senior working with two sophomores,” he said. “For some seniors, that might be an issue, but Nolan embraces it.

“Clearly, you can see it out on the ice. They enjoy working together. Hopefully, that translates into more success in games to come.”

Churchill added a third goal in the first minute of the second period from Doyle, and Haydu picked up his second assist.

Haydu nets goal

The score stayed 3-0 for the next 28 minutes until Haydu scored the final goal off a nice crossing pass in front of the net from Venegoni.

“Tyler is a very special player,” Reynolds said. “We’re lucky to pick him up as a new player. Even as a sophomore, he’s just a dynamite athlete. Just watching the good things he does on the ice, he gets the boys excited and motivates them to step up their games.

“He’s going to quickly grow into a tremendous leader on this team, and I’m excited to see what the rest of this season has to offer.”

Keeper gets shutout

Broyles didn’t have a lot of work to do, but he made every save and continued a personal history of playing well in the tournament.

“This has to be one of Drew’s favorite events,” Reynolds said. “He had a stellar Metro Invite last year. He knows what it’s all about and understands the pressure.

“He’s coming in with a lot more composure, as well as confidence. I expect him to have a big season.”

Struggle for Flyers

Unified coach Ken Anderson was not pleased with his team’s performance in the opener, particularly the way his players skated.

“It was just an overall slow game for us,” he said. “They’re a good skating team over there. We didn’t want to put the hard work in to skate with them. If not for our goalie, it could have been a lot worse.”

Bacon was probably the one bright spot. Anderson thought he played well.

“We left him out to dry a couple times,” he said. “He stopped the puck when he should have. Some of those goals were not his fault.”

The shutout loss was indicative of the need for scoring and what was lost from last season.

“We don’t have those pure goal scorers like we had last year,” Anderson said. “It’s going to be a grind for us.

“There were maybe 12 shots. That’s not going to get it done. You need at least 25.”