The SLP boys suffered a 5-2 loss to the Beekmantown Eagles on Thursday at the SUNY Plattsburgh Fieldhouse, ending their season in the Section VII semifinals.

SLP put together one of its best performances, but was never able to convert on its opportune chances. Some of their shots hit off the post or just sailed a bit wide. Despite that, SLP head coach Josh Spanburgh thought his team gave it their all.

“They absolutely did,” he said. “As I said to them in (the locker room), pucks sometimes don’t bounce your way, calls don’t go your way. That’s all part of sports and hockey, specifically. But in terms of effort, it was an all-out effort by our guys and I’m very proud of what we did tonight even though the outcome wasn’t ours.”

On the other side, Beekmantown converted on those chances, with a lot of help from their star sophomore forward Edward Sweenor.

SLP’s Carson St. Louis, right, takes a shot on net with Beekmantown’s Braden Nephew defending him during Thursday’s playoff game at the SUNY Plattsburgh Fieldhouse. (Enterprise photo — Parker O’Brien)

Sweenor scored four goals — all in the second period — while adding an assist on Mason Carter’s empty net goal in the final seconds of the third period. Pryce Parker, Lee Jarus and Braden Nephew had two assists each, and Jack Rovers chipped in with one assist.

“(Sweenor) is a heck of a player,” Spanburgh said. “(Jarus) too. But we thought we did really well and we thought we did very good defensively, it just didn’t go our way tonight.”

SLP’s Ayden McCormick scored at 4:57 into the first period to give his team a 1-0 lead, and the sophomore forward nearly extended the advantage a few minutes later when his shot from center ice found the back of the net. However, that goal was waved off because of a delayed offsides.

Fellow sophomore Carson St. Louis scored the other goal for SLP with one second left on a 5-on-3 power play in the second period, which made the score 4-2. Ethan Knight, a junior, assisted on both SLP goals.

The Eagles goaltender Jack Bell turned away 34 shots, while SLP’s netminder Cassidy Goodman, senior, capped off his final varsity hockey game with a 38-save performance. Spanburgh said he was proud of Goodman’s growth during his varsity career.

SLP’s Owen Lawrence, right, skates with the puck with Beekmantown’s Jacoby Weeden trailing behind during Thursday’s playoff game at the SUNY Plattsburgh Fieldhouse. (Enterprise photo — Parker O’Brien)

“Four years ago, when I first got into this, he didn’t sniff the ice,” he said. “Then he thought maybe it wasn’t for him for a year and he came back last year and competed with our (then) other goalie, Scottie Nicholas, and he did great work and made great strides.

“This year, he was our rock back there,” Spanburgh added. “He faced a lot of shots every game. He was always in it, right to the end. I’m very thankful for Cassidy and very proud of how he did. He got our internal player of the game. It’s been a real pleasure having Cassidy.”

After SLP took a 1-0 lead, Sweenor got behind the SLP defense and beat Goodman at 4:57 into the second, to knot things up. The sophomore then completed the natural hat trick — three consecutive goals in a game without a scorer in between — on a wrist shot and a breakaway, respectively, to take a 3-1 lead. Sweenor added his fourth goal at 12:41 into the middle frame.

Following St. Louis’ power play goal late in the second period, the score remained at 4-2 through most of the contest, before Carter netted an empty net goal to send the defending sectional champion Eagles back to the title game.

“(Beekmantown’s) coaching staff deserves a lot of credit,” Spanburgh said. “They lost a lot of guys to graduation last year, but they’ve put together a great team that works together and works hard. They get some credit for that as well, but we stayed with them the whole time. They made some great shots to score and we gave it our all.”

SLP’s Will Landriault reaches out to make a play on the puck while Beekmantown’s Parker Broughton trips over teammate Jack Rovers during Thursday’s playoff game at the SUNY Plattsburgh Fieldhouse. (Enterprise photo — Parker O’Brien)

The Eagles, which are now 12-7-2 overall, will take on the Saranac Central Spartans in the Section VII Championship game at 6 p.m. on Monday at the SUNY Plattsburgh Fieldhouse. The Spartans, which are 13-7-1 overall, defeated the Plattsburgh Hornets 3-0 in the other semifinal game.

Meanwhile, SLP ends its season with a 7-12-1 overall record, and despite losing three seniors — Goodman, Will Landriault and Andrew Gay — who Spanburgh said have been a real pleasure to coach, the future looks bright with a bunch of potential returners.

“In this day and age, you don’t know if everyone comes back or not, but I truly think that if everyone on this team can come back, comes back next year we’re going to compete even harder and be even better than we were this year,” he said. “I wish everyone well. I wish those that are capable of coming back, to give it another go because I look forward to it.”

SLP’s Ryan Bartholomew carries the puck down the ice during Thursday’s Section VII semifinal game against Beekmantown at the SUNY Plattsburgh Fieldhouse. (Enterprise photo — Parker O’Brien)

SLP’s Cassidy Goodman turns away a shot during Thursday’s playoff game in Plattsburgh. (Enterprise photo — Parker O’Brien)

SLP’s Evan Harvey takes a shot on net during Thursday’s playoff game in Plattsburgh. (Enterprise photo — Parker O’Brien)