By DAVE O’SULLIVAN
Staff Writer
OCEAN CITY — With two minutes to go in the most highly anticipated boys lacrosse game in the Cape-Atlantic League this year, one of Mainland Regional’s student managers said out loud, “I’m literally shaking right now.”
That’s the kind of tension that filled the air at Carey Stadium as the Mustangs mounted an epic fourth-quarter rally. At one point, Mainland trailed bitter rival Ocean City, 9-3, but the ‘Stangs rallied to get it to within 11-9 with less than seven minutes to go, then shaved the lead down to 11-10 on a goal by Ethan Irizarry with just 1:08 remaining.
But Ocean City senior goalie Mark Kolmer made a huge save with 41 seconds left, deflecting a blazing shot by Irizarry, and junior long pole Harry Pfeifle scooped up a loose ball in the waning seconds as the Red Raiders hung on for a thrilling 11-10 victory and put themselves in a position to win their third straight league title. The Red Raiders are undefeated in league play, while Mainland and Absegami each have one loss.
“It came right down to the wire. I’m glad we came away with the win,” said Pfeifle, a junior defenseman. “We were getting nervous, but we knew if we just did what we were coached to do, we would come out with the ‘W’. We followed coach (Joe) LaTorre, calmed ourselves down and got the win.”
“I’m lucky that I’m balding at the age of 27 due to genetics and not stress. If it was from stress, I’d look like Mr. Clean. I’ll tell you, I’m immensely proud of these kids. Coming into this season, I knew we had an uphill battle. We had seven kids graduate, and at vital positions — face off, defensive middies, attack — our midfield is three sophomores. If you look at our starting lineup, we have seven sophomores playing varsity time, and they are competing with teams that have all upperclassmen. I keep telling them that they have the talent, they just need the experience,” LaTorre said. “A lot of them don’t have much varsity experience, and I hope they understand that the beginning of our season was all for games like this and the playoffs. They know how to handle adversity now. We played one of the best teams in South Jersey (St. Augustine), a great team out of Pa. (Emmaus), and the best team out of Delaware (Cape Henlopen) in the early season, and we got our teeth kicked in, but it was all a lesson. They learned how to play. I keep telling them, we don’t learn from playing local teams that are newer than us. We’re not getting anything out of blowing a team out, and they’re not getting anything out of it. I hope they understand that everything happens for a reason.”
Ocean City (9-5, 7-0 Cape-Atlantic League) started out red-hot, building a 5-0 first-quarter lead on the strength of a hat trick by Christian Kuhn, a goal by Marty Cattie, and a tally by Logan Bloomstead with just two seconds left in the quarter. Mainland (7-4, 6-1) answered with an early second-quarter goal by Antonio Yeoman, but the Red Raiders took a 7-3 lead into halftime. That lead swelled to 9-3 midway through the third on goals by Anthony Inserra and Joe Lloyd, but what looked like a blowout got very interesting in the fourth quarter.
Mainland was able to cut the deficit to 9-5 heading into the fourth quarter, and with 11 minutes to play the goals started coming in bunches. Back-to-back goals by Vincent Giunta and Andrew Bradley made it 9-7, but Ocean City answered with goals by Bloomstead and Cattie to go up 11-7.
The Mustangs continued to mount a furious comeback, however, as Irizarry scored to make it 11-8 and Bradley added another tally with 6:37 left to cut it to 11-9. Irizarry’s goal with 1:08 left got Mainland within 11-10, but Ocean City was able to hang on.
“At halftime, I told them ‘this is not the first time I’ve been in this position and been able to make a stand and a run and come back and win. We’re completely capable, but it’s in your hands. The coaches can give you schemes, call a play, but when it comes right down to it, you have to come out and play.’ And in the second half, they did. It just wasn’t quite enough,” said Mainland coach Clayton Smith. “Ethan said, ‘can I stay down on defense so in the event we get it, we don’t have to make a million passes to get it up (into the offensive zone).’ I said, ‘you know what? It’s your senior year, the last time you’re playing OC, you’re one of the best kids on the field. Go at it.'”
“I live for the Ocean City vs. Mainland rivalry. They have a great team with great players. Ethan Irazzary is awesome. We just prepared really well. We prepared all season, had a lot of hard matchups. We have a lot of losses because we’ve been playing big games like this and it really paid off,” Kolmer said. “I love it. Especially because there is always trash talk before the game and during it. I told everybody this year to just keep quiet and let the scoreboard do the talking for us.”
Each goalie proved why they are two of the best in the league, as Kolmer finished with 11 saves and Mainland’s Hunter Faunce had 10. At one point in the second half, Kolmer got caught out of position trying to get the ball upfield but recovered just in time to thwart a Mainland scoring opportunity with an outstanding save.
“The one save Kolmer had, I said, ‘somebody is looking down on him.’ That was so much luck, I think it hit him in the helmet,” Smith said. “But, it was a save, and in the end we came up one goal short regardless of our comeback run.”
“Dan Walsh played a huge game, and Mark Kolmer — in all my years of coaching, I’ve never seen a goalie, playing in college or playing in high school, who makes saves in big moments like he does. I can’t wait to upload the film because I don’t know how me made that one save. It was like ice hockey when they pull a goalie (from the crease) and he gets back and makes a diving save,” LaTorre said. “I’m very proud of these kids. Winning isn’t everything, I’m just glad they executed and played as a team. That’s all you can as for as a coach.”
“This is what you dream of. It’s great playing under the lights. It was a great environment. We loved it, and I’m sure they had fun, too. We can’t wait for next year,” Pfeifle said. “We graduated a lot of players last year and we’ve had so many players step up this year. Christian Kuhn has been a great addition to our team, Joe Lloyd stepped up big today, and Logan Bloomstead came up clutch as a senior.
“This game was tough,” he added. “We were glad we got out to a big lead. We were honestly surprised about that, but we knew they were coming in here with a vengeance and we’re just happy we were able to put them away.”
Contact Dave O’Sullivan: sully@acglorydays.com; on Twitter @GDsullysays