Blue Ridge boys lacrosse’s Shane Ford knew he had an advantage and that slight edge was enough to put the Barons up for good Saturday.
“I knew I had a step on him when I went around,” Ford said. “It happened to go in.”
Ford wrapped around the cage and buried a shot with 3:59 to play that became the gamewinner and helped lift the Barons to an 11-8 victory over Flint Hill in the first lacrosse game played on the school’s new turf field. Blue Ridge had to unleash a six-goal run in the fourth quarter to get to that win after trailing 8-5 after three quarters.
The Barons were playing on short rest after beating Benedictine Friday, and it showed through three quarters.
“It was definitely a gut check,” said Blue Ridge coach John Hetzel. “I wanted to go back-to-back early just to test our conditioning. They started out real sluggish, obviously they didn’t have legs in that first half but it was good the way that they rebounded.”
But that changed in the fourth when faceoff man Aaron Brown went on a tear with the rest of his unit, winning six of six faceoffs in the final frame. He won 13 of 14 for the game.
“This game, it just came of me today,” Brown said. “I felt like I had to win the faceoffs (in the fourth) so we could win the game at the end. It was a good fourth quarter effort.”
Brown, now in his third-year as a faceoff man, worked hard on his craft in the offseason, and it paid big dividends in the early season victory.
“You never expect guys to have games like that,” Hetzel said. “He’s been steady for us but not a guy who just dominates. Today it seemed like he was in much better condition and had the hunger that you need as a faceoff guy.”
Those faceoff wins helped ignite the six-goal, game-ending run turning it into a full-tile surge. That spurt started with a Brandon Goff goal, followed by a Tyler Ewen before Andrew Link tied it up at 8-8. That’s when Ford struck and Goff followed up with two more goals to complete his second half hat trick and give the Barons some breathing room. In the final minute, Blue Ridge’s defense snuffed out the Huskies’ comeback hopes with Connor Modd making a pair of solid saves to close out the win.
Blue Ridge was tied at 3-3 with Flint Hill at halftime. Ford finished with four goals and two assists on the day.
The win pushes the Barons to 2-0 on the season. They’ll take on Bishop O’Connell on the road Tuesday in a big early season test.
