Scholastic Notes

Tri-state region

New Jersey

IN NEW JERSEY FINALS, DRAMA REIGNS

The staff of the New Jersey State Interscholastic Athletic Association could not have written a better script for an eight-hour field hockey smorgasbord. Nor could they have offered a better main course than the 2000 Group II final between Collingswood (N.J.) and Glen Gardner Voorhees (N.J.).

These two teams escaped a minefield of rivals in the sectional championships and the state semifinals. Collingswood defeated a potent West Long Branch Shore Regional (N.J.) team in the South-Central semifinal, and Voorhees topped perennial power North Caldwell West Essex (N.J.) in the North 1-North 2 game.

Voorhees and Collingswood also played the late game, which started in the shadows and ended after sundown. The cold weather and the highly anticipated game meant that the hot chocolate sales were as brisk as the wind.

The chilled fans were treated to an absolute classic. Both Collingswood and Voorhees swept up and down the field, creating chances with skill and speed. The story, however, was the play of the two defenses.

Collingswood's defense did a splendid job of defending a 1-0 lead taken in the 37th minute on a Lindsay Kocher corner blast. After the goal, the Panthers did not allow a Voorhees shot for the next 20 minutes.

On the other end, The Vikings' back seven, led by goalkeeper Nicole Cardamone and central defender Taylor Webb, were outstanding. Appropriately, Webb who tied the game three minutes from time, as she pumped in a rebound off a penalty corner.

"I had to call a timeout to settle everybody down," said Voorhees head coach Ann Bonavita. "This group, all year, even if they fell behind, had the skill and the desire to come back."

Fittingly, the game went into overtime. In the 13th minute of golden-goal play, a Collingswood corner shot was seemingly ticketed towards the goal, but hit Webb in the leg. As per the rules, a penalty stroke was called.

The Colls' Tracy Bucholski made no mistake with the stroke, and her teammates showered her with a combination of admiration, relief, and satisfaction of winning probably the toughest state tournament in the country.

"It came down to one stroke," said Webb, the superb sophomore, "and what happens, happens. It just showed that both teams were meant to be there. It's a lot better than third or fourth."

"We have a lot of tough competition in our group, and in our conference, and our county to get here," Bonavita saod. "Year in and year out, we graduate nine to 11 seniors, and year in and year out, they're right back again. That's the dedication the kids bring to the program and to themselves."

"I knew (Voorhees) would be good," said Collingswood head coach Sandy Ritter. "For them to beat West Essex, I knew they were right up there with them."

The Group III final between Seabrook Cumberland (N.J.) and Washington Warren Hills (N.J.), held earlier in the day, also came down to one dramatic moment -- that being the game-winning corner blast by junior Dannon Mahaffey of Cumberland in the 11th minute of play.

"Oddly enough, this was the first time we've used that corner all year long," Mahaffey said. "We practiced a lot yesterday at St. Joseph's (of Hammonton)."

"This is kind of fitting, since she scored on that corner the first game of the season against Ocean City," said Cumberland head coach Jeanne Barry. "And she wound up scoring in the last game of the season, too."

Mahaffey's blast was as decisive on the scoreboard as it was psychologically. Warren Hills had taken Ocean City to overtime in 1999, and had revenge on its mind. However, once the Mahaffey goal was scored, the Blue Streaks seemed to slump.

"We played not to lose; they played to win," said Warren Hills head coach Sue Kerr. "We were completely out of sync."

In the Group IV final, the opening goal for defending champion Voorhees Eastern (N.J.) was of similar velocity to Mahaffey's, and had a similar effect on Rockaway Morris Knolls (N.J.). When Eastern's Lori Hillman evaded her mark in the circle and bulleted a field goal in the first half, Morris Knolls seemed stunned.

"When Lori gets the ball, anything can happen," said Eastern head coach Danyle Heilig. "Nothing surprises me at all with her; she's on a level of her own."

And, by the time Hillman -- perhaps the nation's top field hockey prospect in the Class of 2001 -- nailed a late penalty stroke to give Eastern a 5-0 win, Morris Knolls was nothing short of dazed.

"We call it 'The Eastern Express,' " Heilig said. "It's like a train in the second half -- it just goes, and goes, and goes. This team has a year more confidence, a year more experience, and it showed."

What also showed was a motivational fire, stoked the previous night at a student assembly for Penn State football player Adam Taliaferro, the Eastern alumnus who suffered a spinal cord injury in a game earlier in the year. Players and coaches wore maroon and blue ribbons with his number 44 on it, and carried his message of hope and recovery into the game.

"He's doing much better, and he is going to walk in the next couple of months," said senior Sarah Dawson. "This win is for him, because he would come to our games and support us. He is a really, really close friend of mine."

There was a similar lack of drama in the Group I contest, which saw Martinsville Pingry School (N.J.) defeat Gloucester 4-0 (N.J.). However, Pingry's win represented a watershed event -- the first time a college preparatory school had ever won an NJSIAA field hockey title.

The Big Blue had enjoyed a dual role in New Jersey field hockey, holding NJSIAA and New Jersey Independent Schools Athletic Association (NJISAA) membership. In recent years, Pingry and a handful of other prep schools joined public-school conferences and have, for the past several seasons, played almost exclusively in the NJSIAA tournament.

Pingry had never figured highly in tournament play in recent seasons, despite having some tremendously talented players who have gone on to conference all-star or collegiate All-America status.

That changed in 2000. An attack featuring seniors Meiko Boynton, Courtney Leone, and Lindsay Moyer gave Gloucester City little chance.

"Nobody had a bad game," said Pingry head coach Judy Lee. "It's the kind of game you really hope for, but you're not sure that it will ever happen."

THE FAMILY BUSINESS

Caryn Apicelli is in the West Long Branch Shore Regional (N.J.) field hockey record books for having posted 22 shutouts in a season.

Four years after her final scholastic contest, Apicelli came back to her alma mater to coach the goalkeepers, including kid sister Robyn.

Before a Nov. 9 contest to determine the Central Jersey Group II champion, Shore head coach Nancy Williams took Caryn aside.

"You know what? It's going to come down to Robyn. Is she ready?" Williams asked her goalie coach.

The answer was unequivocal.

"Yes, she is."

Robyn Apicelli defended a fourth-minute goal by Ali Shames Dawson through the balance of regulation as the Blue Devils, ranked No. 9 in the TopOfTheCircle.com Top 10 for Nov. 4, 2000, bested No. 6 Moorestown 1-0, in a game attracting southern New Jersey's field hockey intelligentsia.

Amongst the intelligentsia were umpires, opposing coaches, players from other teams, and a few other legends.

Chief among them was Laura Darling, who as Laura Bryn was one of the region's all-time great forwards in the 70s. Her daughter Kelly, the Moorestown senior, was a picture of poise and strength after the tough loss, as she had been on the field for several seasons of hockey and lacrosse.

"Before the game, we talked about how your finest hour is leaving it all out on the field, knowing you did your best, but I know we didn't: we wanted to have a peak game as a team," Kelly Darling said. "We wound up playing their game, hitting the ball all the way up, hoping that one of us could get to it."

The Blue Devils were magnificent, however, creating a second goal chance on a penalty stroke in the 15th minute. However, senior Vanessa Pizzulli had her stroke saved.

The crowd awaited the equalizer, but Moorestown could not execute on its second-half corner chances.

GROUP I READY FOR THE PICKING

Florence (N.J.) is a team famous in New Jersey field hockey circles for heart and determination.

In 1995, a Flashes team won the Group I South sectional crown, then played West Long Branch Shore Regional (N.J.), a team with nine future Division I players in its starting lineup.

Florence held off Shore for 59 minutes and 41 seconds before yielding the game-winner.

"I watched that game," said Florence head coach Gina Carey-Smith. "And I learned something from that game -- but then again, you try and learn something every day."

Florence's task in advancing in the Group I championship has never been easy. The town, south of Trenton on the banks of the Delaware River, is a former steel town which saw its main plant close some 30 years ago.

This year, several powerhouse teams like Shore have moved into larger groupings this season. Whereas there used to be sometimes 20 participants in Florence's segment of the Group I sectional title chase, there were only four in 2000.

But for Carey-Smith, the message remains the same.

"They don't have a lot," she said. "But one thing I can count on is them playing with heart. And that what keeps us here."

BLUE STROKES FROM THE BLUE STREAKS

When Laurie Kerr played field hockey at Washington Warren Hills in the mid-80s, she and her Blue Streak teammates had to break a tie with Pequannock using a penalty stroke shootout.

In the 10 days between the end of Warren Hills' season and the beginning of the state tournament, Kerr ensured that her team worked on them.

"We worked on them for about a half an hour," said Kerr. "My mentality was that if we worked on them, they'll go in."

After 80 minutes of play in a 1-1 game with Lawrence, Kerr's strokers won the stroke shootout 3-1, erasing some of the bad memories of those games in the 80s.

"Oddly enough, that was the one part of the game we did execute," Kerr said.

BACKWARD TO GO FORWARD

Imagine not knowing from year to year what your role on a hockey team is going to be.

Then you may understand the last three seasons for Brielle Rodrigues of Burlington (N.J.) City. She jumped into the goal pads as a freshman, then for the 1999 season played on a forward line that led the Blue Devils to the New Jersey Group I Central championship game.

Her reward? Her junior year, she is back in the goal cage.

"She�s very unselfish and always puts her team ahead of her own glory," City head coach Cindy Robertson tells The Burlington County Times. "Brielle is very grounded and an excellent team leader."

REALITY SETS IN

For the better part of two years, people at Princeton Junction West Windsor-Plainsboro (N.J.) knew that the district was splitting into two schools.

And, for the first month of the 2000 season, the field hockey teams at WW-P North and WW-P South have, despite wearing different colored uniforms, been almost as one team.

The coaches -- Sara Hill of South and Carli Goodman of North -- have become fast friends. The teams traveled together to the Kaylee Scholarship Association tournament at the Wide World of Sports complex at Disney World in Orlando, Fla.

And, fittingly, both teams posted 1-2 records over the two days of play. WW-P North finished fourth, and WW-P South placed sixth.

"It was nice to get the experience in playing other states' teams," said Goodman about the field, which included Oakton (Va.), Allentown Central Catholic (Pa.), Allentown William Allen (Pa.), Newfield (N.Y.), Norwalk McMahon (Conn.), and Assonet Apponequet (Mass.).

"Some of the people who showed us around didn't know what field hockey was, since it isn't played in Florida schools," Hill said. "It was great that we could expose them to this really great, cool sport."

But five days after the end of the KSA tournament, the teams met each other on the field for the first time. West Windsor South edged North 1-0.

"I think it's good, healthy competition," Hill says. "I keep thinking about when I was in high school, and we (Neshaminy Langhorne, Pa.) were in a summer league which was run by my head coach, Linda Pellegrino and Pat Toner (head coach of rival Newtown Council Rock).

"We had been all about 'We have to get Rock' all year, but we noticed how close Linda and Pat were."

Pennsylvania

PENNSYLVANIA FINALS EXHIBIT A GOLDEN TOUCH

They call it "The Golden Triangle."

Connect the points between Lancaster, Harrisburg, and Allentown, and you can find an unusual concentration of winning field hockey teams and players with amazing skills and strength.

It was, therefore, not much of a surprise when three out of four participants in the Pennsylvania Interscholastic Athletic Association finals for 2000 came from The Golden Triangle.

The AA final had two teams from District 3: Oley (Pa.) Valley and Lancaster (Pa.) Mennonite. These teams had met in the District final two weeks earlier, with Oley Valley coming out on top.

The Lynx, who beat Lancaster Mennonite in the 1997 state AA final, staked themselves to an early lead, only to see the Blazers surge in the second half to tie the game at 1-1.

"The second is our half," said Mennonite head coach Laurie Lefever. "But they get all over you in the circle."

As the clock wound down to the final minute of play, Oley Valley won themselves a penalty corner. The Lynx players scrambled around in a somewhat confused gaggle, taking about half a minute to line up for the corner. Oley misfired, but earned a second corner. While that second corner was being lined up, the table umpire counted down the clock to zero.

Suddenly, there was more of a jump in the Lynx' legs after having been somewhat lagging in parts of the second half. Oley Valley earned a third corner, then a fourth. On that fourth corner, the ball popped to the left wing, where senior Tammy Leister rescued it from going out of the circle, turned around, and slammed the ball into the cage.

"This is how it's been all season: we blow our opportunities, but in the end, they come through with it," said Oley Valley head coach Donna Long. "Tammy fiddled with the ball, and I expected (Mennonite) to be all over her. But she had room out there."

"All I wanted to do was get it on cage," Leister said. "And I was thinking, 'We cannot let the ball get out of the circle.' "

Pennsylvania is the cradle of the international rule that allows for the extension of each half for penalty corners earned if they are earned with not enough time for the players to assemble for them. The table umpire at the 1993 Emmaus-Newtown Council Rock final wrote the new rule in her capacity as member of the National Federation rules committee. And she was the third umpire for the AA final in 2000.

"You like the rule when it works for you," said Long. "And you sure don't like the rule when it works against you."

"We've had the rule come into play for some of our game," said Lefever. "Obviously, not with this much at stake."

In the AAA final, the best of District 3 met the best of District 1 as Lititz Warwick (Pa.) topped Buckingham Central Bucks East (Pa.) 1-0.

The game was unique in PIAA field hockey history as it was the first time in the 28-year history of the tourney that the opposing coaches were male. The two males are a study in contrasts.

Bob Derr of Warwick is an experienced coach, having taken over the Warriors in the 1983. He was a competitive wrestler in his youth, and still officiates wrestling matches.

On the other hand, Jeff Harding of C.B. East made the state final in just his fifth season as a field hockey coach, and third as a head coach. He is a native of Toronto, and played both ice hockey and indoor field hockey growing up in Canada. Harding went on to play five seasons of professional ice hockey before settling on teaching.

The two men are genial, quietly intense, and do not expect anything less than complete commitment. Both teams seem to have respond well to their coaching.

"It took a few years to go through the transformation to go from a long-ball game into a short passing game," Harding said. "If you look at the successful teams, that's how they succeed. It took a while for our girls to buy into that philosophy."

"I think I have gotten a bit mild in my old age," Derr said. "I know I was thought of as a dictator and a tyrant when I started. I have gotten better at using my support staff: you can't do it all by yourself anymore."

Harding and Derr also were able to get their players to improve with every tool available, including off-season conditioning, indoor and club play, and Futures.

"The kids are very coachable, and they listen to our coaching staff, which is an outstanding staff," Derr said. "They also put a lot of time into the offseason. The kids have done a fantastic job, making a commitment in December (1999) and coming out with success in November (2000)."

"We have a great custodial staff, that makes our grass look and play almost like turf," Derr added. "We also have a parents' group that does a super job. I also have an excellent coaching staff, especially with Lori O'Donnell, who used to be on the U.S. team. But the credit has to go to the kids. They do all the training, Futures, and everything else."

Both men have learned more about field hockey as coaches than they knew before they took the head coaching position. Like many successful scholastic coaches, Harding has already realized that the occasional non-traditional practice has to be scheduled to keep his players interested.

"We've done the yoga, the kick-boxing, we went to Hatboro-Horsham to play beach volleyball," Harding says. "I always had fun with my coaches, and that really contributes to the success to our program. These kinds of things take their minds off of hockey for a while and gets them back to why they are here, and that's to have fun. They can go for another month: and that's unusual for a team."

And Derr had to take a crash course in goalkeeping when it was decided in 1998 that he would specialize in goalie coaching while allowing O'Donnell to assume responsibilities for much of the other areas of the team.

"We didn't have anyone with a goalkeeping background on the staff -- and I didn't either," Derr said. "I just went to clinics and talked to other coaches to see what I had to do to get them ready."

In the game, C.B. East played outstanding defense on Warwick's front seven. Senior Rachael Bloemeker turned back attack after attack with block tackles not often seen from scholastic players.

"You can't get down on yourself because of one game," Bloemeker said. "We had a really awesome season. We had fun, and went out fighting. It was a great experience."

But the one time that the Patriots did not account for everyone in the Warwick attack was the lone goal of the contest. Junior Kelly Wood snaked in from the left wing, threw in a crossover move that would make Allen Iverson proud, and dribbled past the goalkeeper, sliding the ball over the goal line.

It was a parting of the waters that occurred so quickly, Wood couldn't recall exactly which move was the decisive one.

"It went so fast," Wood said. "It can get pretty crazy out there. I was lucky."

WARWICK WINS A CLASSIC

Kate Miller, like every member of the field hockey team at Lititz Warwick (Pa.), has a series of numbers taped on the back of her stick which tells her which corner to run in which situation.

The sophomore midfielder, however, forgot the script in the 50th minute of play in the District 3-Class AAA championship game against Hummelstown Lower Dauphin (Pa.).

"It wasn't supposed to go to that girl," Miller said. "It was my fault."

But there's no fault when the ball goes into the cage. Miller's hard pass was tipped in by Chelsea Mearig to give the Warriors a 1-0 win in the District 3-AAA final.

"I was just happy to get a goal," said Warwick head coach Bob Derr. "Not that I'm afraid of OT, but we had so much offense in the first half, and to come away emptyhanded hurts."

Mearig's presence had been doubtful over the previous week, as she had suffered a head injury in practice. It was enough for her to possibly be held out for the Lower Dauphin game.

"I didn't want to put her on the field knowing that there was a possibility that there was something seriously wrong," Derr said. "If she gets hit again, I didn't want to have that hanging over my head."

Lower Dauphin had a chance to tie the game in the final seconds of play, but Miller showed her value on defensive corners as well as the offensive ones, clearing the ball off the line and clearing the circle as the clock expired.

"It was coming right at me, so I thought it was going in," Miller said. "But I knew what to do."

"I thought our kids competed very well," said LD head coach Linda Kreizer. "It's a typical District 3 final, and it could have gone either way. But for Warwick to score on a deflection like that, you have to give them credit."

Warwick also deserves credit for withstanding the pressure of having been ranked No. 1 in the TopOfTheCircle.com weekly Top 10.

"All that stuff is a part of being a successful team," said Derr. "It takes a toll, and I have seen some signs of the pressure. But we have wonderful captains in Amanada Eckert and Kristin Harris, and they keep the kids on task."

The Warriors have had every reason to fall off their perch at No. 1, given their incredibly tough regular season schedule. They also had an excuse if they fell short of winning the District 3 tournament, since it is an extremely tough tournament to win.

How tough? Hummelstown Lower Dauphin (Pa.) was the top seed in 1999 and didn't even get out of the first round. But the Falcons were splendid in the 2000 championship game.

"You never know what Linda is going to throw at you," Derr said. "Their kids are always well-coached, and she has been around forever."

DEFENSE MARKS FINAL OF GEORGI CUP

For the past decade, the campus of Hummelstown Lower Dauphin (Pa.) has hosted an invitational field hockey tournament.

But the Georgi Cup probably has never seen defenses like those that were found on the finalists: Lower Dauphin and Newtown Council Rock (Pa.).

Both schools have had tremendous defenses over the years, and the 2000 teams continued that lineage.

Though the Cup will reside at Lower Dauphin, thanks to a 1-0 overtime win over Council Rock, the plaudits went to the defenses. Council Rock, led by sweeper Becky Allahand, kept the host Falcons and their powerful front line off the scoreboard for all of regulation.

"We've been working really hard on defense," says Allahand. "Megan (Hamilton), Kara (Weber), and Melissa (Monkhouse) have been doing a really good job. They're saving our butts a lot, and we did really good against them."

On the other side of the field, junior back Diana Esposito was nearly perfect. She thrwarted, interposed, and otherwise frustrated the dangerous Indian front four.

"It's been kind of the same, steady pattern," says Esposito, late a member of the United States U-16 national team. "We could see these guys in the state tournament."

WINNER-TAKE-ALL FOR CENTRAL BUCKS SCHOOLS

When you think of field hockey rivalries, there are few that are more competitive than Doylestown Central Bucks West (Pa.) and Buckingham Central Bucks East (Pa.). The schools are located only about five miles from each other and have featured field hockey games that have pitted neighbor against neighbor.

But in 2000, the rivalry will be half as good -- or twice as good, depending on your point of view.

You see, Norristown (Pa.) is leaving the Suburban One National conference and is entering the Suburban One American, meaning that the two divisions in the National conference were unbalanced.

The athletic directors, in their infinite wisdom, split the two schools. In most sports, including field hockey, West will only play East one time a season.

For those who want intensity, that may be a good thing; having only 60 minutes to make your point about Central Bucks field hockey supremacy will give teams unmatched urgency.

But traditionalists may have other ideas.

BIG BECOMES BIGGER IN NEIGHBORHOOD RIVALRY

It was yet another classic battle in one of the nation's best field hockey rivalries: Newtown Council Rock (Pa.) against Langhorne Neshaminy (Pa.).

True to form, the defenses knew what to expect from each attack, as top Council Rock midfielder Courtney Hudson marked Neshaminy attacker Sharla Partlon, and top Council Rock attacker was marked by Neshaminy fullback Alicia McGinty. Both marking schemes worked, but another did not.

Council Rock's Meghan Hamilton, a defender, was able to score twice off corners in a 2-1 win. Hamilton, a six-foot defender, is an important member of the corner attack team: she strikes the insertion pass and cuts towards goal for a deflection.

So, how did the biggest player on the field manage to get open twice?

"She's a back, so sometimes people forget about her," said Indians coach Pat Toner.

Indeed, moments before the goal, Toner instructed her inserter to stay low and get ready for the pass. Neshaminy's corner defense had been its usual excellent self, and defensed the set play, knocking the ball all the way to the 25. However, the Indians stayed with the play and found a wide-open Hamilton down low.

Oddly enough, Hamilton managed to perform a sequel a week later: her tip-in at the final horn gave Council Rock a 1-0 win over Levittown Pennsbury (Pa.).