Season Ends for Boys Lacrosse

It's all over for the Newtown boys lacrosse team. The season for seventh-seed Newtown came to a halt on Saturday in the Class L quarterfinals in an 18-6 loss against second-seed Cheshire.

"We had a couple of guys get hurt at the end of the season and we ran out of gas," said Nighthawks Coach Glenn Adams. "We played hard but got out-played and that happens."

Newtown ended its season at 13-7. The Nighthawks were missing All-South-West Conference defenseman Max Nacewitz and All-Colonial midfielder Dan Sclafani and solid senior midfielder Dylan Huebner, who got many ground balls during the season.

Cheshire raised its record to 19-2, showed why it won the Southern Connecticut Conference title and will play third-seeded Glastonbury on Tuesday in the Class L semifinals.

Despite going in as a heavy underdog, Newtown came out strong and took a 2-0 lead. Junior All-SWC player Lewis Thompson (two goals, one ground ball) opened the scoring with 8:45 remaining in the game to give the Nighthawks a 1-0 lead and sophomore Justin Brophy added a goal with 6:30 left to make it 2-0.

After that, it was all Cheshire. The Rams scored the next seven goals, four in the first quarter, to take a 7-2 lead early in the second quarter.

Thompson ended Newtown's drought and broke Cheshire's run with 9:30 to go in the half to make it 7-3 off a feed from All-SWC junior Colby Summerlin (one assist, three ground balls).

The Nighthawks tried to stay in the game and All-Colonial Division junior Will Northrup (two goals, one ground ball) scored two goals in the second quarter to keep it a five-goal game at the break, 10-5.

Rams senior goalie Nathan Gaudio (14 saves) also played a role in keeping Newtown off the board.

All-Colonial League senior Tim Dalton (five shots, one ground ball) had a couple of golden scoring chances in the third quarter but was stonewalled from point-blank range by Gaudio. Gaudio also robbed Thompson and Northrup in the second half as well.

Senior co-captain Connor McNamara (three ground balls) played well defensively and had a few nice checks on Cheshire. McNamara's rugged play showed why he was selected to the All-Colonial Division team.

Junior Ryan Korth (one ground ball) also played well defensively for the Nighthawks and his harassing play enabled senior James Bowers (two ground balls) to come up with a steal.

Also making plays for Newtown were senior co-captain Kyle O'Connor (two ground balls), classmates Alex Miller (two ground balls) and Dana Hansen (one ground ball) and juniors Jeremy Schaniel (two ground balls) and Tom Murphy (one ground ball).

Freshman Dan Hebert (one goal) scored the Nighthawks' only goal of the second half when he circled around the net and tucked it home with 2:45 left to make it 14-6.

Junior goalie Brandon Body (16 saves, three ground balls) also made some nice saves for Newtown.

In the end, the Rams were too much for the Nighthawks as their 41-27 shots advantage would reflect. Seniors Nick Carisio (five goals, one assist), Michael Jordan (three goals) and Nick Guarino (three goals) fired at will and were deftly set up by classmate Todd Heritage (two goals, five assists).

"I'm happy with how we did this year, and we were a better team at the end than we were when we started, which would make any coach happy," Adams said.

Senior Ralph Giovani was also on the All-Colonial team. With many returning top players, next year looks better for Newtown.

"We lose some good seniors but we have a great nucleus coming back and we look good," Adams said.