MORGANTOWN – In a game with major playoff implications on the line, the MHS boys’ lacrosse team defeated cross town rival UHS 8-5 on Thursday night at Pony Lewis Field. The win secured the no. 1 seed in the east region of the playoff bracket for the Mohigans.
MHS (10-3) opened the scoring just 45 seconds into the game on a shot by junior midfielder Henryk Acker after a nice passing sequence. The Mohigans wouldn’t trail at all in the game.
The Hawks (7-2) had the ball on offense just as much as their opponents in the opening minutes, but the Mohigans defense caused a few mistakes out of the UHS attack. Empty possessions piled up for UHS in the first four minutes. Earlier in the week, the leading scorer for UHS — Nolan Danhires — was injured in practice and had to miss the match, which was a difficult challenge for the Hawks’ offense to overcome.
The Mohigans struck once again to double the lead as senior Preston Harman scored on the fast break, something that would become a theme of the night for his team. The third goal of the first quarter came not long after from junior Weston White and MHS would lead 3-0 after one.
MHS goalkeeper Jay Anderson made multiple saves to keep the Hawks scoreless in the first. He finished with eight total saves on the night.
The second quarter began a bit slower than the first, with the next goal being scored after almost five minutes of play. White added his second for the Mohigans to extend the lead to 4-0. Offensive struggles continued to plague the Hawks and they found it difficult to stop MHS in transition.
Conner Montgomery finally put the Hawks on the board at the 4:32 mark in the second. But MHS sophomore Wyatt Kozel would score the fifth for MHS just before halftime as the lead would be 5-1 at the break.
Another Mohigan goal from Harman came after less than two minutes played in the third, another fast break goal for MHS. Montgomery scored his second of the night as well in the third, this one at the 2:21 mark as he looked to spark the Hawks into a comeback as they trailed 6-2 going into the final quarter.
Montgomery completed his hat trick just 35 seconds into the fourth to cut the lead to three. It would be at that point MHS would begin to possess the ball and run the clock. They would add two more goals from Kozel and Acker after a near-four minute offensive possession. UHS would also get another pair of goals before the end of the game to make the score 8-5 but would run out of time to make the comeback happen.
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