Mark Witt ’20 delivered a defensive can-opener move, successfully checking the stick out his opponent’s hands and helping carry Andover Boys Lacrosse to a 9-7 victory over Hotchkiss last Saturday. Andover also played Rivers on Wednesday, ultimately falling 9-10 in overtime. The team’s record now stands at 2-2.
According to Mike Tracanna ’20 and Jayme Wilde ’21, Andover entered the fourth quarter down, but ultimately pulled away with the win in the last five minutes.
“It was the last five minutes or so. [The score] was 6-5 heading into the fourth quarter, and [Hotchkiss] went up 7-5 on us. With five minutes left we scored four [points] straight, so then it was 9-7. It was pretty hype and a pretty back-and-forth game,” said Tracanna.
Despite Andover’s ultimate loss against Rivers, Co-Captain Sawyer Moody ’19 scored two goals in the last minute of the game to carry the time into overtime, which was a highlight of the game, according to Troy Pollock ’21 and Jon Krikorian ’21,
Pollock said, “Sawyer really stepped up. He hasn’t really stepped up like this all year, and then he finally broke out, had five goals. We need that from him, especially as a Captain too.”
It was a lack of consistency and hustle that ultimately cost Andover the game, according to Tracanna.
“[Rivers] is a good team, but they’re a team that we should beat. Today we didn’t really show up and that kind of came back to bite us. We knew it would be a good game because we lost to them last year, but we didn’t really get the ground balls, we missed passes… there was a lot of stuff that were on and off on our game. We should’ve gotten better, and there were still glimpses of a good game, but we just couldn’t pull it together into overtime.”
Andover’s new roster has caused a shift in team’s style of play, according to Jayme Wilde ‘21 and Tracanna.
“The younger team is different, because last year, our style of play was a lot more brute force. We used big bodies and just pushed,” Wilde said.
Tracanna added, “Last year we had a heavy Senior class, so being the older guys it’s just a big change becoming that role model, because we don’t have as many older guys. We’re now the guys they look up to… It’s just a different look.”
Andover Boys Lacrosse will face New Hampton away this Saturday.
