LONG ISLAND – Only a sixth state championship would do for the Jamesville-DeWitt boys lacrosse team, especially since this group of Red Rams experienced getting close to that prize a year ago.
Determined to get the ending right, the Red Rams went back to Hofstra University on Long Island and, against Bayport-Blue Point in Saturday night’s state title game and found the Long Island champions to be far from cooperative.
The Phantoms never trailed and in the second half pulled away, ultimately defeating J-D 13-6 to claim its first-ever state crown playing just down he road from its Suffolk County home.
B-BP first moved out in front when, after a slow start from both sides, Treigh Tomassone scored twice in a span of 30 seconds, only to have the Rams counter with two goals of its own 10 seconds apart, both of them involving Lucas Patchen, who assisted on Graham Kesselring’s goal then converted himself.
They traded goals again, Sam Brazell finding the net for J-D, before the Phantoms seized a 4-3 lead on a Ben Morris goal early in the second period. This, along with two goals by Maclin Keyser, had B-BP in front 6-4 going to the break despite a second Patchen goal.
What ultimately proved the difference was what happened early in the third quarter. Andrew Laubenstein netted a goal early in the third quarter to cut B-BP’s lead to 6-5. Then it got away.
The Phantoms put together a 4-0 run, two of the goals from Connor Curran, that closed out the period and, not content with this, added to the 10-5 margin with three more consecutive goals before Brazell finally ended its drought with 4:40 left, his 79th goal of the season to go with 61 assists.
