Louisville tops Canfield in lacrosse tournament

May 14, 2017 at 12:09a.m.

CANFIELD

There is not much more Canfield could ask for from its first varsity boys lacrosse season.

The Cardinals finished the regular season with a winning record — good enough to host a playoff game and earn bragging rights among area teams.

All that was missing this season was a tournament victory.

Visiting Louisville took advantage of a slow Cardinal start en route to a 10-7 victory.

“I’m feeling down about the loss. Overall, I would say we’re on the right track,” Canfield coach Dennis Peebles said. “Our program is heading in the right direction as a first-year sanctioned team.”

The Cardinals close their inaugural campaign at 8-7, the best among the four Mahoning Valley teams. The Cardinals beat Poland and swept a two-game series with Boardman. While Canfield did not play Cardinal Mooney, the Cardinals entered Saturday’s game with twice as many victories.

“I’m very pleased with the season and the team. We’re a team of 18 guys and we would play teams with 40 guys,” junior midfielder Jared Donchess said. “We did not have a lot of fresh legs out there, but we worked our tails off all season.”

Louisville scored the opening two goals before Donchess could put his team on the board. Bradley Terra put the Leopards up by two once again, but Donchess found the net a second time seconds later to put the Cardinals back within one.

There were some early setbacks with the Cardinals. Midfielder Alec Bowers suffered a twisted ankle and attacker Matt Nielson had to leave the game after suffering repeated blows to the head. The Leopards grabbed two more goals to close the first quarter with a 5-2 lead.

“We have some younger guys. Our goalie is a first-year guy. We had some freshman mixing in and playing,” Peebles said. “There were some jitters from playing in their first playoff game. You can tell any young person to treat this like any other game, but we all know it works in your psyche a little bit.”

The home side got better as the game went on and that’s how Canfield rolled for most of the season. At least half of its victories were come-from-behind affairs.

“We played Boardman and they were ahead the whole game. We were down by about three or four goals in the last few minutes of the game,” Donchess said. “We ended up winning by two.”

Donchess got his hat trick in the second quarter and goals from Alex Petrillo and Brennan Klingensmith helped the Cardinals outscore the Leopards 3-1 in the second to trail 6-5 at halftime.

Canfield took its first lead of the game in the third quarter after goals from Klingensmith and Petrillo came within a minute of each other. Petrillo’s strike was a left-handed shot from a right-handed player.

That lead lasted just four seconds. Louisville’s Brandon Thomas notched two goals in one minute and six seconds to put his team ahead.

Canfield had two prime close-range chances to rally, but one shot struck a post and the second was saved by Jordan Thompson. Two goals from Zack Burkhardt and another Bradley Terra stuck the dagger in Canfield.

Canfield will roll into next season graduating four seniors including faceoff man Petrillo and Nielson. Among the key returnees are leading scorer Donchess and goaltender Ryan Shidmantle, who stopped 15 shots on Saturday. Canfield is in line to have a few more new players that aren’t incoming freshmen, but more athletes looking to take a chance on the Valley’s newest high school sport.

“We already have guys talking about coming out next year,” Donchess said.