Freeport Yellow Jackets

HARMARVILLE – McDowell coach Paul Mancini sat on the sidelines after his team took 15 + penalties in their game against rival Cathedral Prep. The Trojans have had a splendid season at 17-4-2 and had a golden opportunity to move up to as far the 4th seed entering this evenings game and a loss would put them in the 6th seed just behind Upper St Clair and Plum. The boys from Erie have defeated Meadville and Cathedral Prep twice this season and Upper St Clair and their blemishes are like many others include Bethel Park, North Allegheny [twice] and Mt Lebanon. A typical hard hitting Trojan squad with feisty skaters, good positional play and strong goaltending of John Cleary, but they will have to be disciplined to have a chance of advancing deep into the Penguins Cup playoffs. Fox Chapel coach Jim Damp would enter tonight’s game with his team owning a 13-10-0 record and in a battle with Central Catholic and a resurgent North Hills team to claim the 9th seed and a trip to Meadville, which doesn’t bother the Foxes, who defeated the Bulldogs 1-0 earlier this season. Tonight’s test would be interesting since leading scorer Matt Quigley was sidelined and FC would start senior Brandon Beal on Senior Night instead of Eric Thiessen, who has handled a majority of the Foxes big games. When Beal is on he has displayed the ability of just being stellar, but a recent subpar performance against Shaler, put him on the bench in the games final minutes, which may have motivated him to play better. A packed house at Harmarville including coaches from North Allegheny, Mt Lebanon and Meadville in anticipation of the playoffs next week were on hand. Several years ago, there was a meeting at the then Civic Arena to discuss the officiating in Western Pennsylvania, especially at the high school level and after several heated arguments between the referees association [WPHOA] and the high school leagues [WPIHL and SHIHL] at the time. After some heated discussions, it was decided that their would be referee evaluations of the officials by the coaches, which would put into a database and a monthly meeting to discuss issues and potentially would mean officials who don’t meet the criteria, would see limited if any action late in the season and be eliminated for the playoffs. This was back when we ALL were volunteers and the database was maintained and as Vice President of the WPIHL at the time, I attend these meetings and it worked. Now that there is PAID administration, we now see the same guys who were in 1996-1997 were banished from late season competition and having an adverse affect on results of games. Supposedly, in our current environment and according to some coaches, the infinite wisdom of the PIHL is pulling the best officials from first round playoff games and letting ALL officials have an opportunity to call games. So on display tonight were two guys, who in 1997 didn’t cut it and HAVE NEVER IMPROVED and in my opinion cannot handle playoff action in a very important game between McDowell and Fox Chapel and with only 7 games on the schedule tonight, you would think whoever is scheduling these games would check the standings and put their BEST on the ice instead of their near WORST in this situation! Fortunately for McDowell and Fox Chapel, their first round playoff games will be in Erie, where there are some decent officials including McDowell coach Paul Mancini [who is one of the best officials in Western Pennsylvania] who is a veteran of many years of playoff tilts and the Ontario Hockey Association [Major Junior A] in Erie over the past ten years and could only shake his head in disgust at the proceedings early on in this game. Anyway, a weak call in the games first minute of this game put Fox Chapel on the power play and BOOOM….Joe Budz took a Kyle Misour feed and beat John Cleary at 12:38 to give FC a 1-0 lead. Before the bus legs of McDowell could go away, the Foxes caught the Trojan defense napping again and Kyle Misour took a great pass from Budz out of the corner and beat Cleary through the 5-hole and it was 2-0 with 10:21 left. Another questionable call at 9:50 put the Foxes on the power play again and give Fox Chapel credit, they pounced on this game early and knew the consequences as Misour blasted a slapshot from the right point which sailed past the McDowell goaltender and Fox Chapel was now up 3-0 with 8:51 left in the opening period. A series of makeup calls proceeded in the second half of the 1st period and McDowell applied some decent pressure but only resulted in 3 shots to Fox Chapel’s 12. On to the 2nd period and the game was back and forth as the Foxes went on another power play, which the Trojans killed off. McDowell finally had a flurry at around the 10 ½ minute mark, but Brandon Beal would stopped them at every turn as he made a great sliding save on Mark Skirzynski at 9:58 and several other saves to keep the Trojans off the board. Fox Chapel would score the only goal of the middle period, again on the power play as Dan Umanski unloaded a slapshot from the right point, which John Cleary never moved on and went high over the stick side and Fox Chapel held a 4-0 lead with 2:17 left. To add insult to injury, Beal stopped Skirzynski on a breakaway with 40 seconds left and the Foxes went to the locker room with a commanding lead. The third period was just ugly hockey with the teams more interested in getting into individual battles than scoring and after a slew of more penalties and causing League Rep Steve Sturm to use more scoresheets than normally necessary, Justin Kreps put the dagger in McDowell on a 5 on 3 power play, he deposited a rebound past Cleary with 6:33, which put McDowell on the bus headed back to Erie to prepare for Central Catholic in the first round, while Fox Chapel earned a trip to Meadville to face the Bulldogs. You can bet Erie’s best officials will be scheduled on those games!