There’s only one high school hockey coach in Illinois who knows what it takes to beat four-time defending state champion New Trier Green.
His name is David Cromer.
Cromer is the coach at Fenwick, which takes on four-time defending champion New Trier Green in the Blackhawk Cup state final at 4 p.m. Saturday at the United Center. Cromer also preceded Bob Melton as coach at New Trier, where he spent five years and guided Green to the state title in 1994.
Also, Cromer’s Friars (42-15-5) are the only Illinois high school team to beat New Trier Green (48-7-3) this season.
“Straight up, they beat us,” Melton said of the 4-1 loss in October. “Anybody who beats New Trier Green, you really have to respect them. We got smacked in the mouth, and it was good for us.”
New Trier did prevail in its other two regular-season meetings with Fenwick, but the Friars were one of only two teams to hold Green to a lone goal. The other was national power Detroit Catholic Central.
So a fifth straight title for New Trier is not automatic.
“We don’t have to be better than them all year,” said Cromer. “We just have to be better than them on Saturday.”
Cromer’s tenure at New Trier was impressive, resulting in three trips to the state finals and that one championship trophy.
Now, three years after taking over Fenwick’s varsity program, Cromer finds himself back in the finals against his former team, and hoping he’s not second again.
Being second best is something Melton has yet to experience at the high school level. He is batting 1.000, with four state championships in as many years as coach, while New Trier Green has made the United Center a home away from home.
“If somebody would have told me that we had a chance to win five straight championships, I would’ve said they were crazy,” Melton said.
“Maybe you get enough kids to do it two or three years in a row. But five? It would really take a tremendous run, and some luck, for another team to accomplish what we have.”
As a senior he helped Glenbrook North to a state title in 1985 after bypassing high school hockey the year before to be part of a junior national championship team, the Franklin Park Jets.
And though his Illinois-Chicago team didn’t win any notable tournaments during his college career, Melton did outscore former league rivals and current NHL stars Rob Blake and Rod Brind’Amour during his sophomore season.
Cromer, like Melton, played in the Chicago Metropolitan High School Hockey League’s long-dominant North Division. During Cromer’s sophomore season at Evanston the Wildkits advanced to the 1978 finals, where they lost to Maine South.
Personal accomplishments aside, it is the coaching common denominator that makes this season’s state title game so intriguing. Both men helped shape New Trier Green into the state’s most prolific hockey program, thanks largely to the strong youth hockey programs in Wilmette and Winnetka.
It’s so prolific that two New Trier seniors–wingers Steve Martay and Bob Wilson–have the opportunity to make history by playing on four state championship teams in four years.
“I feel more like we’ve won it, not that I’ve won it,” said Martay. “We have this aura where we’re supposed to win [every year] and I hope that keeps going.”
When one school’s team appears in 12 of 28 state championship games, winning eight, and has a 307-23-14 record to show for its last five seasons, that aura is understandable.
“People just kind of think [New Trier coaches] stand there and watch,” Cromer said. “That’s not the case. There’s an expectation to succeed, and it drives you. When I was there, and now with Bob, we coach our butts off.”
They will do so again Saturday.
