As if the stakes in a University-Morgantown boys lacrosse game weren’t big enough, the winner of last night’s rainy regular season finale at Mylan Pharmaceuticals Stadium would enter the West Virginia Scholastic Lacrosse Association playoffs as the No. 3 seed rather than No. 4. And this year, the clear favorite to win it all, undefeated Spring Mills, is a team to be avoided as long as possible.
But let’s face it: MHS at UHS has been highlighted, circled and underlined on both teams’ schedules since Day 1, and the MoHawk Bowl match lived up to all the pre-game anticipation, as the Mohigans broke open a see-saw close match with four consecutive goals late in the third quarter, then closed out the match by buttoning up defensively, prevailing 10-7.
University (6-6) employed a tight zone defensive alignment that held high scoring Spring Mills to under half of their season scoring average in an encouraging 8-3 defeat on Tuesday, and used the same effective tactics against the Mohigans (9-3) last night. However, Morgantown’s active, switching man defense was equally stingy, leading to plenty of forced turnovers, body and stick checks, and intercepted passes on both ends of the field.
The Hawks finally broke through midway through the first quarter when senior Peyton Turner pivoted off a check and fired a bounce shot under MHS keeper Jay Anderson’s stick for the opening goal. Anderson (who finished with six stops) came up big with a quick catch save a minute later, which eventually turned into a successful offensive chance for MHS when Tyler Colebank whipped an underhand shot past UHS goalie Daniel Phillips to knot the score at 1-all. With just under four minutes in the quarter, MHS senior attack Daniel Arthurs drilled a corner shot from an angle to make it 2-1, then it was Phillips’ turn to snag a point-blank shot (one of 9 saves) to keep the deficit at one.
The second quarter opened with a drenching downpour, and both teams traded shots off the post before the Hawks converted a man-up sequence at 9:30 to tie the score 2-2. Evan Acciavatti found Colin Carey in front on a pretty feed and quick shot. MHS see-sawed back in front on another Arthurs tally 45 seconds later after MHS face-off stud Michael Brown captured one of his 14 (against just four losses) to set up the offense for the Mohigans. University potted the next two goals, Grant Oxley setting up senior Devin L’hommiedieu and Carey to leap back in front, before MHS senior Aiden Boone scored off a feed from Preston Harman to tie the score at four goals apiece heading into the break.
Morgantown senior middie Jack Prokopchuk scored two minutes into the third quarter to regain the lead, but a slick double spin move and bounce shot goal from Turner made it 5-5 at the 8:06 mark. Four minutes and another MHS post shot later, the Hawks turned defense to offense with a fast-break goal, Turner’s hat trick goal from Acciavatti to take a 6-5 lead.
Close, hard-fought, competitive games can often turn when one team capitalizes on a fortunate break, and this time, the bounce went the Mohigans’ way – and to the right guy in the right spot – as a deflected pass rolled straight to Arthurs alone in front. He buried it to tie the score just 14 seconds after Turner’s goal, and it led to a backbreaking spurt of dominance by the Mohigans that essentially decided the match. Three straight Brown face-off wins led to Harman’s spin move goal from behind the net (7-6), Colebank’s short-handed bounce shot with 45 seconds left (8-6), and then the killer – another Colebank score with just four ticks left in the quarter.
Leading 9-6 heading into the final quarter, and with Brown’s draw dominance in place, the Mohigans slowed their offense down and ran clock as often as possible. The Hawks crept closer when Turner fired a shot in the corner midway through the frame, but two minutes later, Arthurs again was in prime scoring position in front when a ground ball rolled right to him. His scoop-and-shoot score closed out the scoring, and capped a well-played match.
“You have to give MHS all the credit,” said UHS head coach Brian Houk. “They’re doing it right over there, and they had a great game plan. We felt good about our defense coming in, and we still feel good about it. This was a strong defensive battle by both teams, and we know that our D gives us a chance to win every night. The breaks didn’t go our way, and when we got our chances, we didn’t bury them. We need to find a way to finish, but the playoffs are a rebirth, and I like the way we match up against Spring Mills, so we can’t wait to get after it.”
MHS coach Jeremy Bennett was encouraged by the way his team responded to adversity.
“Once again, like we have all year, we came out of the gate a little slow offensively,” he said, “but it was more of a defensive struggle than I expected. Still, we didn’t get frustrated, we didn’t panic, and eventually we started to execute the game plan. And when the opportunities were there, we converted. We looked at this – both from a rivalry game and a playoffs standpoint – as a must-win, playoff game, and we got the job done.”
The Hawks travel to Spring Mills next Thursday, while the Mohigans are also on the road in their quarterfinal match against Fairmont Senior next Saturday at East-West Stadium in Fairmont.
