Boys' Lacrosse Team Ready For County Tournament

The Cranford boys' lacrosse team drew the fourth seed in the eight-team 2010 Union County Tournament, which allows them to play host to Governor Livingston in Monday's first round game at Memorial Field in Cranford.

Cranford defeated North Brunswick 14-4 and St. Peter's Prep 9-3 this past week, and not only secured a state tournament berth, but also gained that all-important momentum heading into tourney play.

"We need that kind of confidence. GL is vastly improved and we can't overlook them," said head coach Al Reinoso.  "If we beat them, we have the county and state defending champs, Summit. But we can't think ahead. We have to worry about GL first, then we'll do everything we can to go at it with Summit."

"We've got GL Monday in the first round," said goalie Bobby Anstatt. "We're looking to get past them. But we have a tough county with Summit, Johnson and Westfield. We beat Johnson, and hopefully we can do that again if we see them. We may play Westfield. That was a tough loss, 6-3, but we can take them if we play well."

Cranford defeated the Highlanders earlier in the season by a 12-3 margin, with Stephen DiGiovanni scoring five goals and Michael Sheehan two goals. Still, they're not taking anything for granted.

"GL is young. We played them in game two, and obviously they're much improved because they're so young, that's the nature of the game," Reinoso added. "They just had a nice victory themselves which helped them gain some momentum coming in. Then they won their first round game versus Oratory. They're improved, we cannot sleep on them. We have to be ready to shut down their small, quick attackmen. They have sophomores and juniors. We can't fall asleep. We can't take them for granted. We have to be able to do the job."

"I think we definitely have the advantage in that game, offensively and defensively," said Anstatt. "Defensively we have four key players who are going to do well for us."

Anstatt, just a junior, has improved with each and every game as the season has rolled on.

"I'm coming up with some bigger saves when I need to and my clears are better, so that's good."

Reinoso knows the deal when it comes to being successful in tournament play.

"The keys that will be to maintain the level of intensity and performance that we've had over the last two games," he said. "It was missing when we had that little dry spell and that rocky road we had when we lost three in a row. We have to keep that mentality that we have right now, so we play as a focused and talented team. I've been trying to convince them that they're able to perform like this. There were a couple of game where we lost our confidence, and we played down. We really had to get our confidence back. The last two wins were really, really big for us. Wednesday, against North Brunswick, we did a real good job performance-wise and scoreboard-wise, as well. We have to continue that momentum from the last two games."

"Ground balls is what's going to do it for us," said Will Bender. "We've been showing up stronger than I thought we were at this point. We're coming to play."

"It's about time that everybody's come together," said DiGiovanni. "We have underclassmen scoring goals, Will Bender doing great on faceoffs, Mike Sheehan's doing great, a team player, Bobby in the cage is awesome. Going into the counties we know we have two big ones again, either Westfield or Summit."

The Cougars also clinched a spot in the state tournament for the second straight year, as they continue their climb up the ladder, not only in Union County, but across the state.

"That means we can continue our season," DiGiovanni added. "I love playing with this team. It's a fun group of guys."

Game time is set for 4:30 on Monday at Memorial Field, and at this time of the year, home field advantage plays a key role.

"That's big, especially if it's GL or New Providence, because it's a ride, said Reinoso. "We're feeling good about ourselves right now and we like playing at home. If we advance from that game, they're all neutral sites after that, so this is a home game we really want to get."