No catching No. 22 in tournament play

Jefferson skates past Pirates in states

By: Justin Feil
   The West Windsor-Plainsboro South ice hockey team was happy enough to put together a run to reach the state tournament.
   The Pirates didn’t receive a high seed. They were seeded better than just 10 of the teams to make the state tournament.
   As such, they never expected to make a run to a state title, but they had hoped to make a good showing. Thursday, WW-P South ran into a Jefferson team that looked as though it had issues with its 22nd seeding. Jefferson dominated in an 8-1 season-ending loss to the Pirates’ season.
   "They were the best 22nd-seeded team I’ve seen," said the 43rd-seeded Pirates head coach Brian McGurney. "They play in the Haas Division in the North Bergen League. They’re in weak division, but they’ve gone 21-1-1. They lost one game all season. They’re good. They’re a victim of playing in a weaker division. I’m convinced that’s why they’re seed is 22."
   McGurney saw nothing in Thursday’s game that indicated Jefferson deserved that low of a seed. The Pirates didn’t even get on the board until the final five minutes of the game when Jefferson’s back-up goalie was in.
   "Mike DeVestern got our goal," McGurney said. "It was fitting. It’s his last game. He’s worked his butt off the last three years. He’s always asking how he can improve. It’s nice to see him get the last goal of the season."
   DeVestern is one of the key seniors that the Pirates will lose from a youth-dominated team that still put together a .500 season at 12-12-1. The seniors helped make that season — and a return to the state tournament — a possibility.
   "There were a couple games that I felt we should have won," McGurney said. "Dropping a game to Lawrence didn’t help us. Tying Hightstown didn’t help us. We finished 12-12-1. Let’s not try to cover up what we were. We had 14 guys on our roster tonight. The guys, for the most part, left everything they had. They worked hard. Each team has its ups and downs. They worked well. I was happy with our freshmen. We start all over next year and see how it goes."
   The task now is to figure out how to replace some of its seniors, including the team’s leading scorer in Jon Reece.
   "We lose Reece, who finished with 62 points," McGurney said. "He’s our captain and our Most Valuable Player. John Shaughnessy was a four-year player. And we lose Mike. We lose a lot of character more than anything. We have returning a decent nucleus. We don’t lose anything on defense. We have (Mike) Nestel, (Keegan) Martell and (Will) Dzugan back at forwards plus (Darren) Stafford and (Jeff) Katz in goal. The eighth-grade class at Grover, the numbers are pretty good there. While we lose a lot of character, we have some numbers coming in."
   They will be hoping to help the Pirates ice hockey team put together an even stronger regular season to avoid an opponent as talented as Jefferson in the first round of the state tournament next year.