SCITUATE — It wasn’t quite the outcome the Dennis-Yarmouth boys’ lacrosse team had hoped for — an 11-10 defeat at the hands of #2 seed Scituate in the MIAA Div. 2 South semifinals Saturday afternoon — but there were plenty of moments when the Dolphins could have folded up their tent and packed it in.
D-Y’s Andrew Jamiel jukes around Scituate’s Frankie Ragge in Saturday’s 11-10 quarterfinals loss for the Dolphins.
Phil Garceau/Capecod.com Sports
But instead, Saturday marked the dawn of a new era for Dolphins lacrosse.
Dennis-Yarmouth overcame two separate multi-goal deficits, including a two-goal, fourth quarter disadvantage — but instead of mailing in the rest of this tightly-played affair — the Green and White exhibited a degree of mental toughness that hasn’t been previously seen in the program.
“The old D-Y lacrosse would have started taking cheap penalties and starting crumbing and we would have lost 10-1,” head coach JoJo Jamiel explained. “This team… no matter if they were up by five or down by five they do things the right way and have battled all year long.”
Despite the day’s outcome, the leaps and gains the Dolphin lacrosse program made this season couldn’t be taken away as D-Y turned in its finest season in the near-decade history of the team. The Dolphins finished at 16-6, a far cry from their previous best of 10-9. Second-seeded Scituate advances to the Sectional Finals, where they will meet with boarder-rival and top-ranked Hingham on Thursday.
Facing a team with no prior postseason experience, Scituate may have overlooked the Dolphins initially before they realized they were in for quite as fight as the pesky Dolphins never went away, despite trailing for much of the game.
“D-Y is a great team, and talk about facing adversity,” Scituate coach Mark Puzzangara said. “Jumping out real fast and then we give up six goals in one quarter, that’s very uncharacteristic of us, and we were struggling on defense today.”
D-Y’s Ian Crosby winds up to take a shot against Scituate Saturday afternoon.
Phil Garceau/Capecod.com Sports
Look no further than the second quarter turnaround to sum up the Dolphins’ growth. Trailing 4-1 entering the period, D-Y twice battled back from a three-goal deficit.
With Ian Crosby garnering all sorts of attention from the Sailors’ defense, he found Kevin Reid on a back-door cut just 64 seconds into the second quarter, cutting the Scituate lead down to two and sparking a resurgence in the Dolphins’ morale.
Tom Slovak netted his second goal of the game a minute later before the Sailors responded with a pair of goals and reinstated their three-goal lead.
But behind Crosby’s three goals and a game-tying goal from Andrew Jamiel in the latter part of the second quarter, the Dolphins took a 7-6 lead into the final minute.
Scituate’s Jake O’Brien scored with two seconds remaining in the half, splitting a pair of defenders while falling to the ground to send the game into the half tied at 7-7.
“We had to do a better job of containing (Jamiel) and (Crosby),” Puzzangara said. “(Crosby) he’s a house out there and we did everything we could to stop him but he kept finding ways to get the ball in the net.”
Behind the Dolphins’ success on the offensive end was draw-man Kyle DiFransesco. DiFransesco won six of the first seven face-offs in the second quarter, getting the ball into the hands of Crosby and Jamiel who, in turn, made things happen.
D-Y’s Chip Evangalista fends off a check from Scituate’s Cullen Sweeney.
Phil Garceau/Capecod.com Sports
“The three officials changed the entire faceoff procedure today five minutes before the game,” Jamiel explained. “They decided to use college face-off rules today because kids were cheating in previous rounds. But Kyle did a great job controlling face-offs and with the field turf today there weren’t a lot of bad bounces so we were able to scoop through more groundballs.”
Scituate scored the only two goals of the third quarter, both coming on the extra-man opportunity while the Dolphins went 0-for-2 on their opportunities, but quickly erased the deficit early in the fourth quarter behind goals from Jamiel and Slovak (his hat trick goal).
After back-and-forth possessions, which both ended with turnovers, the Sailors took possession and the lead when the ever-elusive Jake O’Brien (five goals) shook a pair of defenders on the goal line and wrapped a goal around goalie Sean McNamara (eight saves). The Sailors won the ensuing faceoff and after draining 90 seconds off the clock, took a two-goal lead when O’Brien fed Mike Norton from behind the net.
The Dolphins needed just nine seconds to answer back, when Crosby netted his fourth goal of the game with 2:51 left, but D-Y would get no closer as the Dolphins were called for a penalty and quickly turned the ball over on their final possession of the game.
While high-scoring games weren’t this season’s forté for the Dolphins, they made the necessary adjustments to keep up with the Sailors. After allowing four goals in the opening quarter, they allowed just seven over the final three quarters.
“D-Y plays really strong zone defense, and when you go against a team with a zone defense you really have to adjust your offense,” Puzzangara said.
The Dolphins will lose seven seniors to graduation this season, but in addition will also lose Ian Crosby who will be attending Deerfield Academy in the fall.
— Story written by Capecod.com contributing sportswriter Phil Garceau. Follow him on Twitter @pcgarceau. Edited by Capecod.com Sports Editor Sean Walsh.
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