Andover Boys Lacrosse fed off smooth transitions from defense to offense to crush New Hampton 12-5 in its home opener last Saturday.
Andover’s offensive success began with goals from Connor Light ’13 and Co-Captain Joe Kruy ’12. In the middle of the second quarter, Kruy’s streak continued when he received an assist from Foster LeBoeuf ’15 and sniped the top right of the goal.
Soon after, Ben Scharf ’12 added two goals of his own with assists from Austin Gaiss ’14 and Stephen Fehnel ’13.
Just before halftime, Larken Kemp ’13 received the ball on a clear and tallied his first goal of the game to tip the score 6-0 in Andover’s favor.
“We were able to score numerous goals in transition because the defense quickly cleared the ball to the midfield,” said Kruy.
David Belluche ’14 jumped on the goal train next. Wasting no time in the third quarter, Belluche beat his defender and sniped a goal top left.
Belluche also took Andover’s face-offs and won the majority of them.
After a few possessions, Scharf found Kemp in front of the goal, who ripped his second goal past the New Hampton goalie. Seconds later, New Hampton finally got on the scoreboard when an attacker dodged his defender and slipped one into the goal.
With two minutes left in the third quarter, LeBoeuf found the net on an underhand rip and beat the goalie near-post. A minute later, Kruy received a pass from LeBoeuf, shot and scored. At the close of the third quarter, Andover remained solidly on top.
In the fourth quarter, North Hampton was able to find the net four times, but not before Kruy got his fourth goal of the game and Scharf got his third.
The clock hit zero with Andover up 12-5, a much-needed win after coming up short to Middlesex over the weekend.
Even in light of victory, Andover seeks improvement.
“Although there were many bright spots, we still need to work on the fluidity of the settled offense,” said Kruy.
Unfortunately, Andover struggled to find that fluidity in its 10-8 loss against Northfield Mount Hermon (NMH) the following Wednesday.
Andover came out slow in the first quarter against NMH, with offense generating just one goal while giving up five.
In the second quarter, Andover began to close the gap, as Kemp sent a pass to Light, who turned and found the top right of the goal in one motion.
Later in the second half, Co-Captain Tommy Shannon ’12 faced his defender, faked left, took the ball right and beat the goalie low, narrowing Andover’s deficit to 3-5.
Andover started the third quarter on the right foot with a goal by Belluche.
Minutes later, Light stick-checked his opponent, caught the ball mid-air as it fell from the NMH player’s stick and tied the game 5-5.
But NMH countered with two goals, one on a fast break and one with a laser from outside. Before the close of the quarter, Kruy answered NMH with a fast break goal.
In the fourth quarter, NMH scored three consecutive goals and tilted the game in its favor. NMH slowed the game down for the remainder of the quarter and looked to kill the clock.
Shannon took his opportunity to regain Andover’s momentum in the last minute of the game with a long-range shot, bringing the score to 7-10. In the faceoff following Shannon’s goal, Kemp picked up the ground ball and passed to Bulens, who then found Light on top of the crease. Light tucked away the goal to make the score 8-10, but Andover was not able to score another goal before the clock ran out.
Andover plays Dexter Southfield this Friday in its third consecutive home game before going on the road to Tilton on Saturday.
