Baldwin Highlanders - 1975 & 1988 AAA

CORAOPOLIS ~ Blackhawk coach Dave Stepanian loves the fact that his team is off to a 6-0-0 start, in first place and ranked # 4 in the Post Gazette poll. The Cougar coach knows that his team will do better when it faces division foes Sewickley Academy and Quaker Valley plus Wheeling Park after that over the next week or so. Blackhawk has done it with the excellent goaltender of John Fitzgerald and the stalwart defensive tandem of Sam Kristian and Eric Steadman leading the way. Quigley has had a rough start in 2003-2004, but head coach Bob DiVito and his trusty assistant coaches Hank and Chris Cummings know having stud forward Kenny Lytle back in the lineup would boast the fragile ego of a club which is off to an 0-4-1 start with losses to ranked teams Serra, Elizabeth Forward, Quaker Valley [2-1 OT] and Wheeling Park and a tie with defending Penguin Cup champion Westmont Hilltop. The Spartans also play with heavy hearts as long time Quigley stalwart Josh Singleton passed away on 9-14-2003 and his jersey hangs above their bench in memory, as he is sorely missed by the Quigley folks. The first period saw some good end to end action as John Fitzgerald made the games first big save on Josh Backus with a sliding stop at 13:01. The deceptive Matt Stepanian showed great presence as he gathered the puck below the goal line and threw the puck at the backside of Josh Brunner and trickled behind the Quigley goaltender for a 1-0 Cougar lead at 8:37. Blackhawk had a couple chances to go up 2-0 with no avail in the middle of the first period. John Fitzgerald became the story in the opening frame as he stoned Josh Backus again from point blank range at 7:17 and made several key saves in killing off a Spartan power play to hold onto a slim 1-0 advantage at the end of one period. On to the 2nd and Drew Bosco got behind the Quigley defense and beat Brunner on the forehand at 8:57 for a 2-0 lead for Blackhawk. Quigley showed great character by turning up their game a notch led by freshmen Sean Wormald and Tim Powell, who almost scored but were turned away by Fitzgerald. Then the Spartans got a break late in the period on a 3 on 1 as Josh Backus put the puck to the net and Kenny Lytle slammed home the rebound with just 48 ticks left and cut the lead to 2-1. Quigley kept on coming and almost tied it forcing the Cougars to take a penalty and put the Spartans on the power play to start the third. Quigley almost tied it on the power play in the 3rd as Nate Dobson just missed at 13:55. The Spartans finally tied the game at 9:45 as Kenny Lytle got behind the Blackhawk defense and made no mistake as he buried a shot upstairs on the stick side to knot the game at two apiece. Blackhawk showed resilience and why they are undefeated as all of their players seem to do the little things necessary to win close hockey games, a sign of good coaching. While Quigley was pressuring to go ahead, the Cougars struck when the had to as Drew Bosco and Eric Steadman provided some nice work to get the puck into the Quigley zone and to the front of the net where unheralded Zach McMillan was stationed and hit paydirt beating Brunner on the rebound at 5:03 for the game winner and a 3-2 Blackhawk victory and a perfect 7-0-0 record.