With a seventh consecutive Section III Class B title secured, now it was back to the state tournament for the Jamesville-DeWitt boys lacrosse team, who met Section IV champion Vestal in Sunday’s regional final at Cicero-North Syracuse’s Bragman Stadium after heavy rain and lightning forced a Saturday-night postponement.
The delay did little to bother the Red Rams, who pounded Vestal 20-7 in a game that it led from the outset.
It was 4-0, with Ryan Archer scoring twice, before the Golden Bears got on the board, and the game got out of hand in the second quarter, when the Rams outscored Vestal 9-1.
A running clock was in place by the end of the third quarter, and again the production was spread around, Archer and Ryan Durkin leading the way with four goals apiece.
Grayson Burns and Griffin Cook both scored twice and earned a pair of assists. Matt Murad had two goals and one assist as Ben Wipper and Charlie Digristina each got one goal and two assists.
Andrew Barkley, Alex Dieroff, Casey Platenik and Anthony Cacchione also found the net as Sam Mueller, who injured his shoulder in the sectional Class B final win over Carthage at the Carrier Dome four days earlier, returned and saw more limited duty, but still picked up an assist.
But even Mueller’s absence in the face-off circle didn’t affect the Rams too much. Sophomore Jack Henry Mulvihill assumed those center-circle duties, won the game’s first four face-offs and did a solid job from that point forward.
A greater challenge awaits J-D in Wednesday nights’s state semifinal at St. John Fisher College near Rochester, where the Rams face Section V champion Victor. Game time is 8 p.m.
The Blue Devils pounded Hamburg (Section VI) 20-9 in its regional final and are the state’s lone remaining unbeaten team. The winner here gets Yorktown (Section I) or Manhasset (Section VIII) in Saturday’s state final – ironically, at Vestal.
