Bosco Lacrosse Defeats Ridgewood for Spot in TOC Final

Coming onto the field at Kean University Wednesday evening, Don Bosco and Ridgewood each had something to prove. For Don Bosco, they wanted their first trip to the Tournament of Champions final. For Ridgewood, they wanted to show that they would not lose a third time to Don Bosco in 2013. When the final horn had sounded, it was Don Bosco that got their wish.

Ridgewood would take the initial advantage on a terrific close range shot from Andrew Seiter just two minutes into the game. The lead would hold for almost eight minutes until Jack Ray took a long pass from goalie William Collopy in for a goal. 

Less than a minute later, Ray shot a pass  to Dan Mazurek who put Don Bosco up 2-1. From the faceoff, Dan Mazurek won the ball, passed quickly to Andrew Spallanzani to Wulster who scored in just five seconds to go up 3-1. On the next faceoff, Spallanzani would get the feed and score in just seven seconds to make it 4-1.

As the quarter drew to a close, Matt Shippee would score for Ridgewood making it 4-2. That would be the closest Ridgewood would come for the rest of the game. 

In the second period, Don Bosco would add three goals, two from Marc Buermann and another from Jack Ray, while shutting down the Ridgewood offense. The remainder of the game was a defensive battle by both teams limiting scoring opportunities and each team trying to keep the other off their feet.

"I feel really good," said Marc Buermann, who finished with two goals and an assist. "It is the first time anyone from Bergen County has been to the TOC final, the first time Bosco has won a state championship, and now the first time we are going to the TOC finals. It's big. I really don't care who we play, I am just happy to be there and hopefully it will be a good game for us."

"A lot of my teammates put me in a great position to score and I was able to finish," said Jack Ray, who scored four goals in the game. "It feels really good. It is a testament to all our hard work in the off season. We finally got here and now we've got to get one more win."

"To beat Ridgewood again, for the third time, is huge," said Brady Wulster, who had two goals in the game. "They were talking a lot about how our first two wins were flukes and they were the best team in Bergen County, but I truly think that we are. We can be the best team in the state after this. It was no mercy basically. We are trying to play every game like it is our last and have no regrets and leave it all on the field. You never know when it might end.  We just go at teams. When they went up 1-0, we were not going to let that bother us. We are just going to keep playing the way we're playing and fix a few things here and there."

UP NEXT - Don Bosco will play Ridge for the Tournament of Champions final Saturday evening at 5 p.m. at Kean University in Union.

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