By Mike Gurnis
The Haas Cup is what Park Regional strives for every season from the start of preseason workouts.
But when the team’s hopes of a title came to an end at the hands of West Morris in the semifinals over a week ago, the team had an opportunity to refocus on preparing for the state tournament.
Behind a three-point performance from sophomore Chase Olszewski, 14th-seeded Park Regional showed off its renewed focus and earned a 5-2 win over 19th-seeded Mountain Lakes-Boonton in the NJSIAA Public Co-op Tournament Play-in round at Mennen Arena.
It was Park Regional’s first state tournament win since the 2012-13 season, when it defeated Ridgewood, 6-5, in overtime in the first round.
“It feels great,” Olszewski, who finished with two goals and an assist, said. “We didn’t get our way in the Haas. So I think coming to states and doing great how we usually do, would be a great feeling to get to the first round and beat this team that we play next.”
Thanks to the expanded state tournament this season with North and South sections and 20 teams qualifying in each, it provided Park Regional the rare opportunity of being the higher seed for a state game. It also got to face an opponent it was very familiar with in the Haas Division in Mountain Lakes-Boonton.
Park had defeated Mountain Lakes by scores of 3-1 and 1-0 this season, and knew it was going to be a challenge. It adjusted its game to handle Mountain Lakes’ 1-3-1 neutral zone trap better, and held the Lakers to just 16 shots- and just six through two periods of play.
“It’s important and it means that we’re a good team when we play the right way,” Park Regional coach Tom Levis said. “It’s almost like that double-edged sword, where are you going to let your season end like this against a team you beat twice…why not reinvent ourselves and recommit ourselves to playing the right way? What does it mean? It’s big from a coaching perspective, because we’ve had such a tough time getting them over that hump in recent years. I think part of it is you have the new format where you’re playing a play-in game against a team you should be able to compete against. Those factors combined helped us refocus and come out flying today and play well.”
It helped that it jumped out to a three-goal lead in the first period, with Olszewski, Matt McDermott, and Andrew Steinberg each finding the back of the net.
“We knew that they run the trap on the defensive side,” Olszewski said. “They’re not really an offensive-heavy team, they’re in the D-zone a lot. We developed our own breakout for that and we were able to find the back of the net today with our puck movement and everything else.”
Mountain Lakes got one back early in the second on a goal from Andrew Wilmot, but Olszewski and Michael Capozzi responded with goals to build a commanding 5-1 advantage through two periods.
Dylan Marion held it down the rest of the way, stopping 14 of 16 shots.
The team’s high level of play in this one can be traced back to a 3-2 loss to Gill St. Bernard’s- the eventual Haas Cup champion- on Jan. 29. While it ultimately fell short in that game, Levis believed that was the team’s best effort of the season, and wanted his team to focus on playing that type of game going forward.
“We got the puck over the red line, we dumped it in. We trapped, we forechecked, we got that rhythm,” Levis said of what his team did in that game with Gill St. Bernard’s. “We tried to really sell that if we play this way, there’s no way you shouldn’t have success against this team, and have a chance to play a number three seed. “
Getting to play a three-seed is now what awaits Park, as it will take on third-seeded Pascack Valley-Hills next week in a first round matchup.
“It’s a great opportunity for us,” Levis said. “They don’t know much about us. We don’t know much about them. I think that’s kind of the way we approached it to try to use the disappointment of not reaching our ultimate goal, and realizing that we still haven’t played that full 45 minute game that we’ve been trying for the whole. The second Gill St. Bernard’s game was probably the closest we came, but this was- at least the first two periods- we really played our game. We paid attention to detail.”
SCORING SUMMARY
First period
PARK — Chase Olszewski (Giovanni Bruno) 8:41
PARK — Matthew McDermott (Andrew Steinberg) 6:41
PARK — Andrew Steinberg (Chase Olszewski, Matthew McDermott) 0:51 PPG
Second period
MLB — Andrew Wilmot (Anthony Maclaren, Lawson Fagan) 12:05
PARK — Chase Olszewski (Patrick Mulligan, Joey Vitale) 5:26
PARK — Michael Capozzi (Joey Vitale) 4:00
Third period
MLB — Lawson Fagan (Eli Forman, Kyle Wenzel) 0:27 PPG
Shots on goal: Park Regional 26, Mountain Lakes-Boonton 16
Saves: Cody Roller (MLB) 21, Dylan Marion (Park) 14
Morris-Sussex Hockey Report 