43
Mooney sweeps lacrosse doubleheader from Poland
Gallery
Mooney sweeps lacrosse
doubleheader from Poland
By Greg Gulas
YOUNGSTOWN
Cardinal Mooney was the first area high school to field boys and girls lacrosse teams.
On Monday at Don Bucci Stadium, both Cardinals teams made it quite apparent to the Poland Bulldogs that there’s no substitute for experience.
In the opener, the Cardinal Mooney girls stopped Poland by a 16-4 count while in the nightcap, the boys raced to a 13-2 halftime advantage and then coasted to a 17-3 decision in the season opener for all four teams.
Jimmy Brown had seven goals and five assists while Mark Ricciardi added five goals and Jake Weber three tallies and four assists to pace the boys.
Kincaid Mrakovich had two of the Bulldogs’ three goals.
Kirsten Joss notched eight goals and Taylor Harris added six more scores in girls’ action.
“We lost eight seniors off of last year’s squad and will depend on the leadership of our seven seniors this season,” Cardinals boys head coach Chris Joss said. “J.B. [Jimmy Brown], Mark [Riciardi] and Jake [Weber] are all guys who like to score. Tonight, however, we played great overall defense and in his first varsity start in goal, Nick Blasko did a great job. His hard work in off-season really paid off.”
If you add Mike Phillips’ second quarter goal, seniors accounted for 16 of the Cardinals’ 17 tallies.
Junior Andrew Turnbull, who scored the fourth goal of the game just under nine minutes into the contest, was the only other Cardinal to post a goal.
Brown registered four goals in the opening half and three of Cardinal Mooney’s four scores after intermission.
“We’ve worked really hard since the end of last season and it showed in tonight’s opener,” Brown said. “Our offense moved the ball well and there was plenty of ball movement, but it all started at the defensive end. Nick Blasko limited Poland to just three goals and we’ll take that, but we need to build off of tonight and just keep getting better.”
Ricciardi posted all of his scores in the opening half of action.
“Our coaching staff did an excellent job to prepare us and knowing that we would start the year against Poland, we’ve had them on our mind since the end of last season,” Ricciardi said. “When you have someone like Nick protecting our goal, it makes our job at the offensive end that much easier.”
Blasko said his defense was on top of their game.
“I trust my defense and they were absolutely great in front of me tonight,” Blasko said. “We came out hot, stayed hot and had good ball movement, which really showed in our offensive production.”
Tony Zeno is a senior mainstay on defense.
“Our defense shut them down and our offense and face-off guys did a great job. It’s the kind of start that you want to have to your season,” Zeno said.
Mrakovich said his team continues to learn and grow.
“We’ll learn from this experience and hopefully continue to grow as a team,” he said. “It’s a slow process, but we’ll come together eventually. Hard work is what it’s all about.”
In girls action, the Cardinals built a 10-2 halftime lead en-route to their season opening victory.
Joss and Harris, the team’s only two seniors, combined to score 14 of their team’s 16 goals.
“We lost 11 seniors so we have a lot of new faces starting the year,” Joss said. “Out mindset was to come out strong and just keep building momentum.”
Harris said everyone was nervous and just wanted to get the season under way.
“The adrenaline was definitely pumping and with such a large group of freshmen, everyone was pumped and ready to get going,” she said. “Once we got started, all nervousness went away.”
Toni Chahine, a former Cardinals three-year letterwinner, is in her first season with the team and joins Chris Amill in leading her alma mater.
“We have a lot of young players so this was a baptism under fire for them tonight,” Chahine said of the auspicious start to her coaching career. “Kirsten and Taylor are excellent leaders and great examples for our younger players. We just want to build off of this as we move forward.”