Mepham Boys Lacrosse Doubled Up in Season Opener

The old notion proves true again. Getting a good start really does mean everything. Just ask the Mepham boys lacrosse team. After allowing three goals in the first 2:14 of play, it was hard for the Pirates to regain their composure, and they were defeated by the score of 10-5 at Mepham on Tuesday night.

"I think we just came out a little flat-footed," Mepham Coach James Koester said. "They [East Meadow] came out fired up, and they were just a little bit better than us."

Mepham was behind the eight ball from the start. East Meadow scored the game's first four goals, two of which were from Brandon Noblett, and Mepham was desperate for an answer. Surely enough, their prayers were answered when Miguel Lozada had the ball up top. He saw that the keeper was screened, so he launched a short hopper toward the net, and it was able to find the back of the net to get the Pirates on the scoresheet.

"It was a man-up situation," Lozada said. "I just stood up at the top, and when I noticed the screen, I just sent a worm burner through the goalie's legs."

The first quarter ended with the Pirates trailing 5-1.

The beginning of the second quarter belonged to the Jets as well, as brothers Chris and Lou Buschi each tallied a goal to increase the East Meadow lead to 7-1, and then Mepham started getting its act together.

Consecutive goals by Vin Moryc and Matt Hackett cut East Meadow's lead to just four, but that would be the closest that the Pirates would come.

"I was hoping that we could make it to 7-4," Koester said. "There was one play we didn't make, and they scored because of it, and it's a big difference between 8-3 and 7-4."

Joe Caramante added his second goal of the game in the third quarter, and he gave credit to his teammates credit.

"They really kept the field spread out for me tonight," Caramante said. "That's really all I needed to get going tonight."

Mepham once again showed resiliency by cutting the lead to four with two straight goals from Kevin Zollo and Anthony Ippolito, but East Meadow put the icing on the cake when Brandon Noblett secured his third goal of the game.

"I have been having a really rough week," Noblett said. "Today, I finally got my shot back."

Perhaps the most well-rounded performance from Mepham was from Ippolito, who had a goal and two assists in the contest.

"We just gotta be stronger defensively," Ippolito said. "We let up too many easy goals from in close, but I know it is only going to get better from here."

One impressive part of the game as a whole for Mepham was its discipline. It was clear that East Meadow planned on being a physical presence, but the Mepham players would not allow the Jets to bait them into bad penalties, and that's why they were at a plus in the penalty column.

"It was good," Koester said. "We didn't give up, and the kids definitely showed me something with that part of their game."