Sports of All Sorts: John Jay Lacrosse Looks to Rebound This Week

The boys lacrosse team season has just gotten under way, but already, John Jay has experienced both ends of the emotional spectrum.

Opening week featured an 18-8 win over Brewster followed by a dramatic, come-from-behind 8-7 victory at rival Yorktown.

Following the Yorktown win, John Jay, which had held down the 20th spot in Inside Lacrosse's National High School Rankings soared to the No. 7 spot.

John Jay then fell 12-3 at unranked Manhasset. Though Manhasset is the defending Class C state champion, the Indians were not ranked nationally entering the game. (Ten players from last year's Manhasset team are now playing at the collegiate level, with seven at NCAA Division I programs.)

The possession game proved to be John Jay's undoing against Manhasset as the Indians fell short of their quest to win a game on Long Island for what would have been just the second time in the school's 31-year varsity history. (The one time John Jay did win on Long Island came in the 2007 Class B state semifinals when the Indians upset the then top-ranked team in the nation, Huntington.)

Manhasset, led by Syracuse University-bound midfielder Ricky Buhr, used its dominance in the faceoff X to get and maintain possession of the ball, leading to numerous scoring opportunities.

John Jay, which trailed 3-0 after the first quarter and 5-1 at halftime, saw Manhasset quickly come away with four third-quarter goals to take a 9-1 lead entering the final period. Mike Daniello, Brendan Morris and Jimmy Morris had John Jay's goals.

John Jay can quickly put behind the Manhasset loss this week. The Indians have a pair of crucial league games against formidable opponents. John Jay plays at Rye on April 15 at 5 p.m. (Rye has won four Class C sectional titles in the last five years and snapped John Jay's 47-game win streak against Section 1 teams in 2008.)

Next up is a game against Somers in a rematch of last year's Class B sectional final, won by Somers 14-9 to end John Jay's streak of four straight sectional championships. Somers also beat John Jay during the regular season last year 10-7.

This season, because of the institution of geographically aligned leagues, John Jay and Somers will play twice during the regular season, with the second meeting scheduled for May 4 at Somers.

"It (John Jay-Somers) is kind of like Somers-Yorktown in how it has developed into a rivalry," first-year John Jay coach Tim Schurr said.

The games promise to be hard-fought and emotionally packed.

For starters, Schurr is the former head coach of Somers.

"When I started at Somers, Somers was not a rival of Yorktown," Schurr said. "When I got to Somers, they were 7-12 and lost to Yorktown 22-1. That didn't happen overnight. It's a rivalry now though."

If that's not enough, Schurr's sons, Eddie and Kevin, are defensemen for Somers.

"I coached for 10 years with Jim Turnbull (at Yorktown) when we played against (son) Merrill (Turnbull) at Mahopac," Tim Schurr said. "We'll play against each other. My boys will play hard. They'll do the best they can to help their team win. At the end of the day, win, lose or draw, the only issue I'll have is if they don't give me a hug before they go to bed that night."

John Jay connection at new Meadowlands debut

There was a heavy John Jay presence as the new Meadowlands Stadium in East Rutherford, N.J., made its debut as an NCAA men's lacrosse regular-season record crowd of 25,710 attended the Konica Minolta Big City Classic.

In the second of the day's three games, top-ranked Virginia picked up a 7-5 win against No. 2-ranked North Rockland. Sophomore attackman Chris Bocklet, an all-America attackman for John Jay in 2008 who is now Virginia's leading scorer, had a goal.

Third-ranked Syracuse, the two-time defending national champions, defeated No. 5 Princeton 13-4 in the final game of the day.

Former John Jay star Chris Daniello, a senior attackman and Syracuse's leading scorer, had an assist. Princeton is coached by 1986 John Jay graduate and former Dartmouth College standout Chris Bates.