There were plenty of shakeups.

4th edition of 2018 pound-for-pound wrestler rankings on the way to a statewide Top 50.

New Jersey-based retailer Toys "R" Us announced plans to close up to one-fifth of its stores including Babies "R" Us locations in April

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An amazing family resemblance.

With his daughter Brooke on the verge of scoring 1,000 career points, Woodbridge coach Bobby Timinski went through this closet of mementos from his storied playing career at Colonia when they both made a shocking a discovery.

"The other day, after she didn't get it on Saturday, I opened my closet in the basement and I saw my ball (from my 1,000th point) and it said 1/23/90. I had to do a double take. I couldn't believe it," recalled Bobby Timinski. "Then when I realized it was against New Brunswick, we knew we were going to do it on the same day 28 years later against the same team (New Brunswick). It's just so crazy."

Said Brooke, "I had no clue until after the Colonia game on Saturday and they told me. I was like 'wow, that's pretty crazy.'"

On Tuesday, the 28th anniversary of her father's 1,000th point, Brooke scored her 1,000th point in Woodbridge's 56-45 victory over New Brunswick.

With Bobby on the sidelines and her entire family in the Woodbridge High School stands, Brooke Timinski set the milestone in with 2:30 left in the first quarter when she drove from the left wing and hit a right-handed shot off the backboard to give her team an early 11-4 lead.

Congratulations Brooke Timinski on 1,000 career points #WeAreBarrons pic.twitter.com/etdenBj88x

— Mr. Mortensen (@WHS_Mort) January 23, 2018

"It wasn't any more pressure," Brooke said. "If I got it (today), I got it. And if I didn't, I didn't. It was pretty cool thought that it was on the same day and everything."

Bobby Timinski scored 1,112 points in two seasons at Colonia. He then went on to score 1,325 points at St. Anselm College.

Heidi Waterman Timinski, Brooke's mother, scored 1,601 points at Shore Regional. Brooke is the seventh girl in Woodbridge history to score 1,000.

Timinski, who is averaging 18.2 points per game on the season, was limited to a season-low four points on Tuesday as she faced a box-and-one from New Brunswick. Rather than force shots, Timinski displayed the other aspects of her game - most notably her passing and rebounding, while her teammates picked up the slack offensively.

Kameron De Vogd scored a game-high 21 points to go with nine blocks and six rebounds. Aliyah Santos had 14 points and Tamirah Gibbs added 10 as Timinski finished with seven rebounds, seven assists and three steals.

Brooke Timinski (22) and her team after scoring 1,000th point. (@BarronsSports)

"New Brunswick guarded me pretty well so I had to do other things to help our team win, not only to score, but make my teammates score so we can win," Brooke Timinski said. "If I wasn't going to score, then they're going to score so we can win."

"It says a lot about our team in that the other players stepped up when they needed to make plays because New Brunswick was doing a great job of denying Brooke the ball," said Bobby Timinski.

Aniyah Thomas led New Brunswick with 18 points, 15 rebounds, six steals and five assists. Nakima Lue added 11 points and 14 steals.

With the win, Woodbridge kept pace in a competitive GMC White Division. But for Bobby Timinski this one understandably meant more than that.

"It's a lot of emotions," Bobby Timinski said. "Certainly I'm her coach, but I'm her dad first so it was kind of hard. But I tried to keep it in check and keep everything in perspective. It was certainly a sense of relief when she did it."

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Trooper fired at drug suspect charging at him with a pickup truck, authorities said.

A state grand jury voted not to to bring charges against a State Police trooper who shot a man driving at him at a New Jersey Turnpike rest stop last year, authorities said.

Christopher Pizzichetta, 46, was seen by several witnesses ramming two police vehicles with his pickup truck before he drove at the trooper head-on, according to a statement released Wednesday providing new details of the March 30 encounter.

Nearly all police shootings in New Jersey are sent to a grand jury for review unless the "undisputed facts" show use of force was justified, according to the Attorney General's Office. 

Authorities say the ordeal started when five plainclothes troopers from the State Police were patrolling the Molly Pitcher Service Area in Cranbury in unmarked vehicles on a drug detail.

One trooper reporting seeing Pizzichetta, of Lewes, Delaware, shooting what appeared to be heroin. The trooper drove near the vehicle to get a closer look but Pizzichetta drove off to a remote end of the parking lot, authorities said.

When police approached him a second time, knocking on the pickup's window and showing their badges, Pizzichetta popped the truck into reverse and attempted to flee. Police say he hit an unmarked SUV head-on and then backed into an unmarked pickup.

"Rather than driving to the ramp leading to the exit road, he jumped a curb and cut across a concrete raised island" and "drove directly at" one of the troopers who was on foot, the statement said.

Two civilian witnesses reported seeing Pizzichetta drive toward the trooper, who fired six shots, striking the suspect in the chest, shoulder and head, the statement said. He was pronounced dead at the scene.

Two other witnesses -- a married couple -- reported seeing another trooper fire at the pickup from behind, but authorities said Wednesday that there was no ballistics evidence showing that trooper fired his weapon.

Police later found a syringe and several bags of heroin, the statement said.

None of the troopers or witnesses were identified in the account released Wednesday by the state Division of Criminal Justice.

S.P. Sullivan may be reached at ssullivan@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter. Find NJ.com on Facebook.

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A Middlesex County jury found Andre Evans not guilty.

An off-duty Newark police detective who was accused of pointing a gun at a man outside a steakhouse was found not guilty by a jury. 

Andre Evans, 43, was arrested by Woodbridge police following an altercation at Chris Michael's Steakhouse & Lounge in October 2015. He was charged with fourth-degree aggravated assault and possession of a weapon for an unlawful purpose.

Police said after the incident that Evans and a 54-year-old North Carolina man were arguing inside the restaurant parking lot when Evans allegedly pointed his service weapon at the man's face.

The restaurant's assistant manager, Darnell Ross, testified during the trial that the altercation stemmed from the North Carolina man asking Evans' wife for a cigarette in the parking lot. Ross said he intervened and took the gun from Evans.

Evans' attorney, Patrick Toscano, contended that his client was trying to arrest the man.

"It remains both bemusing and quizzical that a decorated Newark Police detective who is attempting to effectuate a valid and lawful arrest, which state law in point of fact mandates he so do, thereafter finds himself as a defendant in a criminal prosecution based upon an alleged victim's mendacious statements," Toscano said in a statement.  That having been said, the jury in this case was clearly dialed in and for that, Detective Evans is most appreciative."

The Middlesex County Prosecutor's Office declined to comment.

A 14-year police veteran, Evans was reassigned from his duties pending the outcome of an internal investigation, a Newark police spokesman said at the time.

"Officer Evans' status with the department remains unchanged," Newark Public Safety Director Anthony Ambrose said in a statement. "The Office of Professional Standards is conducting an administrative investigation to determine if Officer Evans violated any department rules, regulations or policies that govern an officers' actions or behavior. Once the investigation is complete, the department will determine what if any actions should be taken against Evans."

Alex Napoliello may be reached at anapoliello@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @alexnapoNJ. Find NJ.com on Facebook.

Naquan Wilson and his girlfriend were arrested at their Perth Amboy home this week

A Perth Amboy couple who tooled around in luxury vehicles and liked to go on shopping sprees at tony stores funded their extravagant lifestyle with credit cards pilfered at the Long Island post office where one of them worked, the Nassau County District Attorney said in a statement Wednesday.

Naquan Wilson, 28, was arrested and charged with possession of stolen property, forgery, identity theft and unlawful possession of personal identification information. Also arrested was Wilson's girlfriend, 33-year-old Shantavia Davis.

Davis, also of Perth Amboy, has been charged with possession of stolen property, forgery, identity theft and unlawful possession of personal identification information.

Bail for both was set at $100,000 bond or $50,000 cash.

WIlson, a letter carrier, allegedly stole credit cards that had been addressed to people on his postal route as well as other routes. Wilson activated the cards using cardholders' personal information he bought on the dark web using the crypto-currency Bitcoin.

Authorities say Wilson took more than 30 cards between August and January. The thefts were discovered when the cardholders in Garden City complained they had not received them.

Wilson was in possession of six pieces of mail containing credit cards when he was arrested Tuesday, according to the DA. Nearly $30,000 in cash and two guns were also found at the home the couple share.

Davis and WIlson, who has worked for the Postal Service since 2013, allegedly had a taste for luxury goods purchased at the Mall at Short Hills Mall and elsewhere, including brands like Gucci, Louis Vuitton, Zanotti and Christian Louboutin. The couple also owned or leased high-end vehicles, including a BMW and a 2014 Maserati Quattroporte.

Davis allegedly kept the stolen credit cards he used for some of the purchases in a sock he brought with him when he went shopping at Short Hills. 

"These defendants are charged with stealing Nassau residents' mail and using stolen credit cards to fund shopping sprees for luxury goods from Louboutin shoes to high-end electronics," Nassau County District Attorney Madeline Singas said. "Thanks to the collaboration of our law enforcement partners, these alleged scammers will face justice."

Paul Milo may be reached at pmilo@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter@PaulMilo2. Find NJ.com on Facebook.  

NJ.com releases its statewide conference and wrestling group rankings for Jan. 24, 2018

Interstate 95, where it meets Route 4 in Fort Lee, is the second most congested stretch of highway in the country.

WASHINGTON -- Ready to cross the George Washington Bridge?

You already know you'll have to wait. What you may not know is that you'll be crawling through one of America's epic spots for traffic congestion.   

Interstate 95 where it meets Route 4 in Fort Lee, just west of the bridge toll plaza, is again the second most congested bottleneck in the nation, behind only the intersection of Interstate 85 North and I-285 in Atlanta, according to the trucking industry's annual report.

And things are getting worse: the average speed through the area was 25 mph during rush hours, down from 27 mph in 2016.  

"I don't know if there is any way to fix it," said Gail Toth, executive director of the New Jersey Motor Truck Association. "You plan to wait. It's calculated into the costs of doing business."

More people dying of alcohol-related crashes in N.J.

The figures come from the American Transportation Research Institute, the trucking industry's research group. They are based on GPS data from more than 800,000 trucks.

I-95 in Fort Lee moved into the second spot on the rankings last year, where it overtook the Chicago intersection of Interstates 290 at Interstates 90 and 94. That intersection remained in the third position. I-85 in Atlanta has had the dubious distinction as being the congested stretch of highway for three years running.

Toth said more truckers making early morning or making nighttime trips to avoid the traffic in Jersey's most congested spot. During off-peak hours, the average speed through the area climbed to 39.4 mph.

The only other New Jersey location in the top 100 truck bottlenecks was Interstate 287 in Piscataway, coming in at No. 26. The average speed through that area is close to 49 mph, dropping to 38 mph during rush hours.

"That's sort of a nightmare," Toth said. "We've exceeded the space, They've built so much along 287. We never ever improve our infrastructure when we do that. It's bumper-to-bumper all the time and that's starting early in the morning."

The intersection of Interstates 76 and 676 in Camden County was ranked 97th in the list released last year but dropped out of the top 100. 

The report was issued in advance of plans by President Donald Trump and Congress to rebuild the nation's public works. Trump came into office promising an infrastructure program but has yet to offer any proposals.

"As we focus on infrastructure, I do have hope these locations will start to improve," said Rebecca M. Brewster, president and chief operating officer of the 
American Transportation Research Institute.

"When the economy is good, we're going to have more demand for goods, and therefore more trucks. When you see increased truck traffic, it means the economy is doing well but we to fix these lcoations."

 The top 10 are:

1. Atlanta's "Spaghetti Junction," the intersection of Interstates 85 North and 285.

2. I-95 at Route 4 in Fort Lee.

3. I-290 at Interstates 90 and 94 in Chicago.

4. I-75 at I-285 north in Atlanta.

5. Route 60 at Route 57 in Los Angeles.

6. I-90 (Massachusetts Turnpike), at I-95 in Boston.

7. I-695 at I-70 in Baltimore.

8. Long Island Expressway (I-495) in Queens.

9. I-71 at I-75 in Cincinnati.

10. I-64 at Interstates 64 and 71 in Louisville, Ky.

Jonathan D. Salant may be reached at jsalant@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @JDSalant or on Facebook. Find NJ.com Politics on Facebook.

Ernie and Anthony Lunardelli are unlikely to officiate again

A father and son who were about to officiate a high school football game in October but walked off the field after members of one team knelt during the national anthem have resigned.

The New Jersey Football Officials Association accepted the resignation of Ernie and Anthony Lunardelli, which was submitted at the end of the 2017 season.

The resignation effectively ends an investigation that the group launched when the pair told officials from Colts Neck and Monroe high schools before the Oct. 27 game that they would not officiate if any players protested.

Referees who walked out after anthem protest shouldn't work in N.J. again | Politi

They were replaced after four Monroe players took a knee on their home field.

Association past chairman Scott Heiser told the Home News Tribune he can't imagine a scenario in which they'll ever officiate another high school game again.

"We've tried to tell our officials they are there to do a job under an officiating contract and they should honor it," Heiser said. "To the greatest extent possible, they should leave their politics at home and remember they are there to do a job, there for the kids, there for the game," he added.

Monroe Township School District policy permits the type of peaceful protests the athletes held, according to athletics director Greg Beyer.

"We have to follow what is in the policy and pretty much the policy is if a kid doesn't want to stand for the Pledge of Allegiance, that's his constitutional right," said Beyer.

The protest by the refs at the game in Middlesex County sparked an internet firestorm and reignited the debate over athletes kneeling for the anthem. The movement began last season with former San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick and spread across most levels of sports.

Dozens of NFL players have knelt, prompting public rebukes from President Donald Trump. High school athletes also joined the movement intended to shine light on racial and social injustices and police brutality.

In an interview with NJ Advance Media in October, Ernie Lunardelli said he warned the person who assigns officials to games that he would leave if students knelt during the national anthem.

"I'm not in favor of anyone disrespecting our country, our flag, the armed forces," Lunardelli said in October. "What they're protesting has nothing to do with the national anthem and I'm against it, so I decided to protest for them kneeling and that's what I did."

He said his decision to walk out was his form of protest.

"Whoever is disrespecting that flag and the national anthem, that's who I have a problem with," Lunardelli said. "That's my protest. I don't care if it's a baby, if it's an 80-year-old man, anybody. I don't care. Any race, color, I don't care who it is. It's not the way I was brought up and it pisses me off that people are doing that."

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Brielle Bisogno (14) of Toms River North secures a rebound in the fourth quarter of the 34th Annual WOBM Christmas Classic girls basketball final in Toms River on Saturday, Dec. 30, 2017. Manchester won, 61-48.Andrew Mills 

The jackpot is up to $112 million for Saturday's drawing

A Powerball ticket worth $50,000 was sold at the Edison train station, state lottery officials said Thursday morning. 

The ticket for Wednesday's drawing matched four numbers as well as the Powerball.

Wednesday's winning numbers were 5, 9, 11, 33 and 64. The Powerball number was 21. The multiplier was 3x so if  the person who bought the $50,000 ticket spent an extra $1, it would have been worth $150,000.

2 tickets split nearly $1M Jersey Cash 5 jackpot

The odds of matching four numbers plus the Powerball with a $2 ticket are about 913,129 to 1.

No one across the country hit the $92 million jackpot. One ticket sold in Kansas matched five numbers and is worth $1 million.

The jackpot for Saturday's drawing is worth $112 million with a cash option of $69.1 million. 

Powerball is played in 44 states, Washington D.C., Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands.  

Jeff Goldman may be reached at jeff_goldman@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @JeffSGoldman. Find NJ.com on Facebook.

The Tiny Tots Therapy website says it serves 88 school districts and has been in business 10 years

A 39-year-old woman who owns a pediatric therapy company has been charged with defrauding the Edison school district out of more than $75,000 by billing for services she never provided.

Rebecca Dean, 39, of the Martinsville section of Bridgewater, submitted falsified invoices to the board of education between September 2016 and January, the Middlesex County Prosecutor's Office said in a statement. 

Dean, who owns Tiny Tots Therapy in Scotch Plains, was arrested Wednesday. She was charged with theft by deception and money laundering. Dean was released without bail and is due back on court on Feb. 15. 

Bookkeeper stole $190K from this North Jersey school district: cops

The Tiny Tots Therapy website says it serves 88 school districts and has been in business 10 years. 

No one answered the phone at Tiny Tots Therapy on Thursday morning. 

Authorities are still investigating and ask anyone with information to call Det. Sean Sullivan of the prosecutor's office at 732-745-4060.

Jeff Goldman may be reached at jeff_goldman@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @JeffSGoldman. Find NJ.com on Facebook.

Copperfield urged the public not to rush to judgment, saying he was falsely accused in the past

Magician David Copperfield tweeted a statement in support of the #MeToo movement on Wednesday, calling it "crucial and long overdue." But in his message was a significant caveat and a plea that the public not rush to judgment: 

"Imagine what it's like, believing in the movement, and having also been falsely accused publicly in the past," he said. 

Copperfield, 61, a native of Metuchen, then said he was weathering "another storm."

Hours later, Copperfield had become the subject of a story from The Wrap alleging that the magician had drugged and sexually assaulted model Brittney Lewis in 1988, when she was 17.

Lewis, who said she reported the allegations to the FBI in 2007 after seeing reports of Copperfield being investigated for other allegations, told The Wrap the alleged assault occurred at one of Copperfield's California shows after she had competed in a modeling contest in Atami, Japan where Copperfield was a judge. A videotape shows both were present for the contest and members of Lewis' family and a chiropractor said she told them about the alleged assault after it happened. 

Lewis doesn't plan to file a lawsuit against Copperfield, but couldn't anyway, due to the statute of limitations being one year since she first reported the incident, which was 2007. 

Copperfield didn't respond to requests for comment on Tuesday and instead issued the statement on Twitter.

David Copperfield at Copperfield Lane, a street in Metuchen named in his honor. (Star-Ledger file photo) 

The magician, who according to Lewis had asked the permission of her grandmother for her to make the trip from her home in Utah to attend his show, which was possibly in San Diego (The Wrap says accounts from the time make this plausible, though Lewis wasn't sure of the city), was 32 at the time of the alleged incident.

Lewis said Copperfield allegedly poured something into her glass and she asked about it, but he just said he was "sharing."  She said she blacked out after taking a few sips, but remembers seeing Copperfield in her hotel room, allegedly kissing her and taking her clothes off. Copperfield sent Lewis home even though she wasn't supposed to leave yet, and she said he had her write a letter stating that she was OK.

"He wanted to me know that nothing happened because I was underage," she told The Wrap. "He said: 'I didn't enter you.'"

She said his assistant later reached out to offer her tickets to another show, but she declined. 

Copperfield's Twitter mention of being falsely accused refers to accusations made in 2007 by Lacey Carroll, who accused the magician of sexually assaulting her in the Bahamas. The claims resulted in an FBI investigation of Copperfield but the case was closed and Carroll dropped a lawsuit, after which she was charged with making false sexual assault accusations against another man. 

The governor sped to the Reformed Church of Highland Park, which has provided sanctuary to immigrants for years, after an ICE target sought sanctuary there Watch video

Gov. Phil Murphy rushed to a church that has provided sanctuary for immigrants on Thursday after two Indonesians were detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials and a third sought refuge in the church.

Gunawan Liem, of Franklin Park, and Roby Sanger, of Metuchen, were detained as they dropped their kids off at school Thursday morning, said Rev. Seth Kaper-Dale of the Reformed Church of Highland Park.

Murphy went to the church, which has been housing immigrants for years, on Thursday afternoon to meet with three people who have taken up sanctuary in the church, including one who avoided detention by not answering his door.

"We obviously have to put our heads together and figure this out," Murphy told a crowd gathered at the church. 

"It's not our country, it's not our values, it's not the country you came to to escape persecution," he later said. 

U.S. Rep. Frank Pallone, Jr., who was also at the church, said the men who were targeted have cooperated with federal officials since they came to the United States.

"They are valuable members of their community and there is absolutely no reason for ICE to prioritize their detainment," said Pallone, D-6^th Dist.

Kaper-Dale said everybody was terrified.

e can't believe ICE would make the choice to destroy communities in that way," he said. "We're here to highlight the injustice of the Donald Trump administration, which is the most horrific administration anyone could imagine."

Gov. Murphy greets Yohanes Tasik, center, a resident of Avenel for the past 29 years who has been living in the Reformed Church of Highland Park for the last two weeks since he has been afraid of being deported. To the left is Harry Pangemanan who Thursday morning avoided being picked up by ICE. Aristide Economopoulos | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com 

Kaper-Dale, who ran for governor as a Green Party candidate last year, has said he is trying to save at-risk Indonesian refugees who fled their country to escape religious persecution more than a decade ago.

Kaper-Dale said he had brought Harry Pangemanan back to the church, which is four blocks from Pangemanan's home after the Indonesian immigrant didn't answer knocks on his door from ICE officers.

According to Kaper-Dale, the officers were in a Ford Explorer with tinted windows.

Pangemanan was getting ready to take his 15-year-old daughter to school, but instead called Kaper-Dale, who was at the church four blocks away from Pangemanan's home.

Kaper-Dale pulled up next to the Ford to ask what the officials inside were doing, but it sped away.

Pangemanan joined two other Indonesian man at the church, one who has been there for 14 days, another for 110 days.

The pastor drove to the Highland Park High School to let Pangemanan's daughter know he was safe.

"I came for a better life...but this (is) on my mind every single day. It's on my kid's minds every single day," he said.

His family plans on staying in the church as the community remains on high-alert of more ICE raids.

The two men detained Thursday and Pangemanan had one-year stays of removal - one was supposed to check in with immigration officials on Tuesday, another on Feb. 14 and one in March.

"They had no reason to believe ICE would perform a preemptive attack," Kaper-Dale said.

Both men taken from their homes Thursday are being detained at the Essex County jail, according to Kaper-Dale.

https://t.co/etEganISuy

-- Sophie Nieto Munoz (@snietomunoz) January 25, 2018

Last year, several other Indonesian Christians who were detained by ICE were deported, according to Kaper-Dale. The men were ethnic Chinese Christians and said they fled Indonesia after they were persecuted for their faith.

In May, Arino Massie was deported, leaving behind his wife and a 13-year-old U.S. citizen son who was in school when his father boarded a plane. Saul Timisela and Rovani Wangko were sent back to Indonesia in June after their requests to stay in the country were denied. A fourth man was also taken into custody and later deported.

All four had applied for asylum more than 10 years ago but missed the deadline for eligibility and were ordered deported. The group worked out an agreement with ICE to stay in the country so long as long as they periodically checked in. But when the four reported in May, they were detained, according to Kaper-Dale. 

ICE officials today did not immediately respond to requests for comment about the latest detentions.

Murphy meets with Harry Pangemanan, who is claiming sanctuary from ICE https://t.co/t2Q3Ul2Wzp

-- Steph Solis (@stephmsolis) January 25, 2018

Meanwhile, New Jersey will join more than a dozen other states in a lawsuit that challenges President Donald Trump over his decision to end a program that allowed undocumented people brought to the U.S. as children to avoid deportation.

The move was expected after Murphy, a Democrat, promised during his campaign to join the fight against Trump, a Republican, after he ended the Obama administration era Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program.

Murphy made the announcement in Trenton on Wednesday along with the state's attorney general, Gurbir Grewal, who didn't give an exact date when the state would join the lawsuit. Rather, his office will wait for "the most opportune time to file the papers."