St. Stephen’s & St. Agnes boys lacrosse is by any measure a boys lacrosse powerhouse.
They’ve won five of the last six VISAA Division I lacrosse tournaments and after beating Landon and Georgetown Prep they moved to No. 5 nationally in Inside Lacrosse’s poll last week.
They’ve been a particularly large thorn in St. Anne’s-Belfield’s side and the Charlottesville-based Saints hadn’t won a game in Alexandria against SSSA since 2011, most recently losing 4-3 back in early April.
Which is why the smart money probably would’ve been on SSSA in the second half of the two squads’ state quarterfinal matchup as the No. 3-seeded Alexandria squad held a three-goal lead late in the third quarter.
The smart money would’ve been wrong.
STAB roared back from that deficit with seven unanswered goals to grab a 9-5 victory and a spot in the state final four, ending several years of frustration at the hands of SSSA.
The comeback started with 1:21 left in the third quarter, when STAB keeper Eric Buhle made a solid save, found Lang McNeely on an outlet and McNeely fed Joe Robertson who scored the first of his three second half goals.
“I was so impressed with the heart our kids showed when we got down 5-2 late in the third quarter,” said STAB coach Bo Perriello.
Robertson scored his second on a big-time individual effort with 9:20 left in the game, and then Austin Park then went to work at the faceoff. Park won seven of eight faceoff chances during the huge surge by STAB, and the win early in the fourth helped Brodie Phillips tie the game at 5-5 off a feed from Javon Johnson.
Park won the next faceoff and then found Robertson for the hat trick and STAB’s first lead. Two minutes later it was 7-5 STAB after a Josh Reiss goal off a George Marshall assist.
STAB’s defense then made a tremendous two-minute stand, and the offense made it doubly painful for SSSA with a top shelf goal by Jack Schultz. After killing a man-down situation on defense, Brodie Phillips found Khalig Howard to finish off the scoring in the closing minutes.
Lee Parkhill had a tremendous game for STAB as a defensive midfielder and the close defender group of Kareem Johnson, Gideon Elron and Pierce Bower played the entire game as they held the No. 5 team in the country to just five goals. Eric Buhle had nine saves to aid that performances, including some key stops in the second half while Rob Schotta dominated between the lines.
Phillip Robertson ran the STAB offense and scooped up five ground balls (second only to Park’s six), having a major impact despite not getting in the scoring column.
The Saints will get a chance to continue their revenge tour against a Paul VI that also clipped them in the regular season in the VISAA Division I semifinals Friday at 5 p.m. at the University of Richmond’s stadium. Paul VI beat STAB 13-12 in overtime on April 10.
