Baldwin Highlanders - 1975 & 1988 AAA

12/2/03 ~ QV flexes muscles by wearing down Deer Lakes CORAOPOLIS Quaker Valley coach Kevin Quinn has resigned himself that he will not have the services of Ben Herring for a better part of the season and I hope he knows that the Penguin Cup Playoff Rules require a player to play 10 games to be eligible for the Playoffs. Unfortunately, Herring has become yet another fallen victim to being developed by Quaker Valley and the Beaver County Midget program, and then being snatched by the Pittsburgh Hornets, who make high school aged kids sign [10 + pages] contracts stating their commitment to the organization, which includes something along the lines of NEVER missing a practice for ANY High School activity. So Ben’s being deprived of being an opportunity to enjoy his senior season at Quaker Valley, a team he grew up with for the pipedream of being the next Ryan Malone…..and I have news for you Ben, Ryan played for Upper St Clair and R.J. Umberger, the next NHLer from Western Pennsylvania played for Plum when there was a sensible agreement that you played High School during the week and Amatuer or Travel during the weekend. Anyway, the Quakers have moved on without Herring, who has played only a handful of games, and according to people close to the team, play better without him. Quaker Valley is one of the top teams in Class A because of the great coaching and stability of Quinn and assistant Jim Miller, who have been with the program from the beginning. The Quakers have two bonafide superstars in Sam Hairston and Furman South, who have really carried the scoring for QV to a 4-1-0 start, lone blemish a tough 4-3 loss to Somerset. I am sure Deer Lakes coach Al Palowski has a ton of empathy for Quinn, as the Lancer coach has seen a handful of Deer Lakes players plucked away for Junior B or Shadyside Academy and is doing an unreal job just keeping his alma mater afloat. Deer Lakes has talent but their bench looks more like men’s league than Varsity with only a dozen or so players dressed for each game. The Lancers do have some nice looking players in Brendan Orris, Jason Graney and foreign exchange student Stefan Karsay, who have been called on to replace Matt Disanti and Sean McIntyre. The Lancers opened the scoring as Brendan Orris scored at 7:16 for a 1-0 lead. QV’s Sam Hairston tied the game a short time later at 4:42 at 1-1. This was a pretty even game in the opening period as the Quakers out shot DL 11-9. On to the 2nd and Jason Graney gave Deer Lakes the lead with 9:44 remaining 2-1, which the held onto until with 5:48 remaining Kelly Elson beat Jiri Frkal to tie the score. Deer Lakes was under siege at this point as the Quakers blasted 16 shots at Frkal for the middle period, while Jed Michael saw only 5 shots, the result was that the roof came crashing down on the Lancers, as Hairston scored his 2nd goal at 4:57 and completed the hat trick with 1:51 remaining to break open a tight game to a 4-2 QV advantage. Jason Burrus added a tally with just 11 seconds left which may have put the dagger in the Lancers at 5-2. Hariston picked up his fourth goal just 15 seconds into the final period beating Frkal on the backhand to make it 6-2. Furman South got into the act burying a wrist shot upstairs over the glove hand at 12:42. Jason Burrus banged home a Hairston shot at 9:34 as the Quakers seemed to be getting stronger and the rout was on 8-2. QV’s foreign exchange defenseman from Denmark Jeppi Boldsen put the exclamation point on a 9-2 Quaker Valley victory, with a big blast from the right point as the Quakers out shot Deer Lakes 35-23 on the evening.