Sports
Boys Lax To Lack Mueller In State Tournament
The senior star is still sidelined with a knee injury.
If the Ridgefield High School boys lacrosse team is going to make a deep run in the state tournament, the Tigers will have to do it without one of their best players.
Ridgefield coach Roy Colsey has confirmed to Patch that senior midfielder/attackman Kurt Mueller, who is bound for Towson State University in the fall, will miss the remainder of the season.
Mueller has not played since suffering a knee injury in the fourth quarter on a 10-9 victory over Wilton on May 13 and is not expected to play in the state tournament.
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Although Mueller is listed on the Tigers' state tournament roster, Colsey said the player won't see any action.
The fifth-seeed Tigers (12-5) host No. 12 Greenwich (11-6) in a first-round game on Thursday in a rematch of an FCIAC quarterfinal playoff game, won by the Cardinals, 8-5. Greenwich avenged a 16-9 defeat to Ridgefield in the regular
season.
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Although the Cardinals endured an up-and-down regular season, finishing just 8-6, they got hot at the right time. After beating Ridgefield, Greenwich also knocked off top seed Darien (10-7) and No. 3 New Canaan (5-4) to win the FCIAC championship, so it enters the state tournament with plenty of momentum.
Even though he has not played in more than two weeks, Mueller is the still the Tigers' assists leader with 33. He also has 17 goals to rank second on the team in scoring with 50 points, trailing only Mike Galione (71 points).
Ridgefield has gone 1-3 in Mueller's absence, although two of the losses came against Westchester powers John Jay and Somers.
If Ridgefield wins Thursday, it likely would play at four-time defending state champion Fairfield Prep in the quarter-finals on Saturday. The fourth-seeded Jesuits are hosting No. 13 Southington in a first-round contest Thursday.
Fairfield Prep has elimimated Ridgefield from the state tournament in each of the last two years.
Two years ago, the Tigers lost to Fairfield Prep, 15-14, in triple overtime in the state championship game, then fell to the Jesuits, 11-10, in the semifinals last year.
