By DAVE O’SULLIVAN
Staff Writer
@sjglorydays on Instagram
EWING — Ocean City High boys lacrosse coach Joe LaTorre stood on the hot turf of the football field at The College of New Jersey on Sunday afternoon after his boys suffered a heartbreaking 9-5 loss to Sparta in the Group 2 state championship game and guaranteed that his squad would be back in 2027 to hopefully bring home the program’s first title.
Was it the frustration of being so close and coming up short talking? Maybe. Do the Red Raiders really have enough returning talent to make another run at winning it all? Probably.
The loss snapped an impressive four-game postseason winning streak by Ocean City after the Red Raiders suffered a crushing defeat to rival Mainland Regional in the Cape-Atlantic League Tournament championship back on May 21. The Red Raiders went on to dominate Ewing and Barnegat in the first two rounds of the South Jersey Group 2 sectional tournament, then they scored four times in the second half to beat Allentown, 9-6, in the semifinals before an epic four-overtime, 6-5 victory at home over Manasquan that earned Ocean City just its second sectional championship ever.
The only other time Ocean City advanced to the state championship game was in 2021, when it lost 5-4 to Chatham in the Group 3 title game.
“I have to tip my hat to these seniors. They were the first group since 2021 to get us back to this game and I’m very proud of them. I do think they’ve set the foundation for us next year to get back here, and to execute, and to be the team that’s out there celebrating with that trophy. My hat’s off to Sparta — I thought they outplayed us, out-schemed us. I’ve felt way worse in other losses. Today, I thought they were the better team and were more deserving to win than we were,” LaTorre said. “I told the young guys that we’re going to get back here next year. You can put that in the paper — I will guarantee we will be back here next year, and we will try to avenge what happened here today. I actually think Sparta has a very good chance to get back here as well, they are kind of in the same boat as us. We do graduate a lot of seniors, but we have a ton of young talent that is ready to step in. It helps when you have a goalie like Timmy (Windfelder) coming back who keeps you in a lot of games. In hindsight we’re not even here if he doesn’t make nine saves in the four overtimes (in the state semifinals).”
“We made history as the first team in five years to make it to the sectional finals, and we won that. I’m happy overall. This game doesn’t define who we are,” said senior Jack Scherbin. “That Mainland loss hurt, but we had bigger goals ahead of us. That Allentown win — that really got the gas going for us to ramp it up, and that Manasquan win, that was a battle and we came out on top. Obviously, this game wasn’t the ending that we wanted, but we won sectionals and that’s still a trophy in the trophy box.”
Windfelder, a junior, followed up his crazy 19-save performance in the sectional title game with another eight saves against Sparta, but the Spartans were too much in the second half, especially late in the third quarter. After Ocean City (16-7, 5-0 Cape-Atlantic League American) rallied back from a 4-2 deficit with goals from Otter Donohue and Charlie Beseris, Sparta (16-5, 3-4 NJILL Waterman) scored three straight goals to close out the third quarter with a 7-4 lead. Eddie Brown scored off the next faceoff following Beseris’ goal, and right after Brown, Sparta faceoff man Johnny Palmer scored on a breakaway to make it 6-4. Jace Stiansen, who scored a game-high four goals, ripped a shot from 20 yards out with 33 seconds left in the third quarter as the Spartans started to get some separation.
They scored twice more in the first half of the fourth quarter to push the lead to 9-4 and put the game out of reach.
“Those face-off transition goals — we knew coming into the game that they were very good in transition. They hung 14 (goals) on West Morris on Tuesday, and that’s a team that hasn’t let anybody score more than four,” LaTorre said. “So, we knew our hands were going to be full in that aspect. We just had a little bit of a breakdown in our game plan, and we never got a chance to get back into the game after that string of goals that put them up by three.”
“We fought, and they fought really hard and came out on top. They are a really talented team,” Scherbin said. “I’m proud of our guys, we worked really hard and the stuff behind the scenes helped us come through when we needed to. Coach LaTorre is awesome; all of our coaches are awesome and they’ve been building us all season. I don’t know a coach who spends as much time on film as (LaTorre) does, but it works. Our win in the sectionals sets the precedent that Ocean City has a pretty good lacrosse program.”
Scherbin had a goal and an assist to finish out his career with 78 goals — including 72 the last two seasons — and 33 assists. He said he plans to continue his career at Stockton University this fall.
“He did a phenomenal job this season. He really grew as a player, and I find myself fortunate that he’s going to Stockton, so it’s not like he’s going to be too far away and I look forward to watching him grown into an even better player in college,” LaTorre said. “His teammate, Chris Pontari, will be there with him, and last year’s graduate, Zio Wright. There are a lot of Ocean City kids at Stockton, so it’s nice that we’ll get to see them competing at the next level and getting better each day.”
Ocean City scored 232 goals this season, an average of 10 per game, and the Raiders have some serious talent returning in 2027. Beseris scored 18 goals this year, Otter Donohue had 43 goals and 24 assists (both team highs), Liam Kazmarck finished with 23 goals and 19 assists and Dominic Vallese had 11 goals and 16 assists. And Windfelder had more than twice as many saves as goals allowed.
“I told the kids, one game doesn’t define you as a player or as a person. Today wasn’t our day, but I’m very proud of what they have done this year,” LaTorre said. “I can’t thank the other coaches enough for what they’ve done. We have a great group. It’s a family. It’s going to be weird waking up on Monday and not going to the turf (at Carey Stadium), but I’ll be on my computer looking at film to see what I can fix for next year.”
“We were brothers before, but (the playoffs) brought us that much closer,” Scherbin said. “We were spending every second with each other, on and off the field. We held each other when we lost and celebrated when we won.”
