Scotch Plains-Fanwood Falls to Cranford on Ice

One of the fastest skaters in Union County was on the mark again Tuesday night.

Forward Eric Pawlick worked his magic by scoring four goals to lead the Cougars to a 6-1 victory over Scotch Plains-Fanwood at Warinanco Park in Elizabeth.

"The first period we came out a little sloppy, but we really turned it up in the second and third," said Pawlick. "It's looking good, we're jelling as a team, I think we'll end up in at least the top three."

Scotch Plains got on the board first when junior Ed Logie scored at the 6:01 mark of the first period off an assist by Kevin Lewis to make it 1-0., the first time they had a lead in a game this year.

But with under two minutes left in the period, Cranford evened the score on a goal by Gary Merwede, who was assisted by Pat Hartnett to tie the game at 1-all.

Four minutes into the second stanza, Pawlick put one home off an assist by freshman Tom Fitzgerald to make it 2-1. Two minutes later, Sean Feeney got on the board to move the lead to 3-1 and Pawlick added another nine seconds later thanks to Hartnett's second assist of the game.

Pawlick picked up the hat trick at the 1:44 mark of the third period and finished his big night with his fourth goal 8:53 into the final frame. It was everything Hurley needed to see from his team.

"We stepped up against Westfield and had a great outing, it carried over to tonight, the kids are playing well," said Cranford head coach Rich Hurley. "It's a very young team with a lot of freshmen and sophomores logging a lot of minutes. There's a steep learning curve for a lot of guys, and they're starting to get it."

Cranford received another top performance from goaltender Trevor Hertz, who stopped 12 shots to earn his second straight win, just one night after saving 33 pucks in Cranford's 4-3 win over Westfield.

"Against Westfield, he was unbelievable," said Hurley. "He saved the game on a couple of occasions last night. Today he wasn't challenged as much, but he made all the stops he had to make. If you're going to win a league title, you need goaltending, and he's definitely providing that right now."

"Well, we knew they'd be coming off an emotional high after beating Westfield last night," said Scotch Plains-Fanwood coach Matt Gualtieri. "We told our kids before the game that we'd have to weather the storm early, we want to get a jump on them. Getting the first goal was big, it's the first lead we had all year, so it was nice."

Goalie Jason Breit seems to have quite a future ahead of him. Just a freshman, he's receiving high praises from his coach already.

"He's been our M.V.P. since the start of the year," said Gualtieri. "You wouldn't know by looking at our scores. He's very composed for a kid his age, very poised. He doesn't let things rattle him. He's one of our hardest workers, even in practice, And he's not afraid to speak his mind. He's got definite leadership qualities about him. It's nice to know we have him for another three years."

For SP-F, it's not about the wins so much as it is getting that much-needed experience.

"We're more concerned about the kid's effort, because we're rebuilding this year, we graduated a lot of kids, so we're just looking to get little positives out of every game," said Gualtieri. "The work ethic was there. That's our biggest concern right now, closing the gap."

Meanwhile Cranford is starting to think big, as the county tournament edges closer and closer. Hurley is hearing rumblings in the locker room about making some noise when the time comes.

"We'd like to keep the focus on that, but we want to make sure we don't forget about everything in between," he said. "If we're going to win, we have to keep getting better. We just have to keep improving, working hard and keep capitalizing on our opportunities. If we do that, we're going to have a great shot."