Austin Prep frustrates St. Mary’s boys lacrosse

LYNN – Playing with its state tournament hopes on the line, the St. Mary’s lacrosse team came out flying on Tuesday against Austin Prep at Manning Field.The Spartans had a 3-1 lead after a quarter on a fog-filled night. But the second and third quarters proved to be all Austin as the Cougars ripped off eight straight goals to assume control and roll to a 14-4 win.Click here for a photo gallery.”In almost every game this year, we’ve come out and put a few goals in right away,” St. Mary’s coach Dan Ritchie said. “But we have to learn to put four quarters together. Once we figure that out, we are going to become a very competitive team.”The Spartans started in perfect fashion against the Catholic Central League leaders as Bucky Surette scored a man-advantage goal just 38 seconds in. Austin tied the game three minutes later before Brian Griffin, set up by Steve Poliskey, gave the Spartans a 2-1 lead with 7:22 left in the first.Justin Thorne then bolstered Spartan hopes with 101 seconds left on the clock when he ripped a shot past Cougar goalie Zach Sullivan to make it 3-1, St. Mary’s.Just as the second quarter kicked off, the fog turned into a steady mist and a steady stream of Cougar chances began posthaste.John Donahue scored a pair of goals two minutes apart to draw the Cougars even. Keegan Callahan gave Austin the lead with 4:56 left before Brian Haas delivered what would prove to be a pivotal goal with 30.5 seconds left to make it 5-3 AP at the half.”We talk about trying to go out and win every quarter and it would have been nice to go in at the half tied 3-3 and in good shape,” Ritchie said. “But they put in a couple late and that put us in a difficult situation.”Austin’s momentum kept right on going when the teams came back from the dressing room to begin the third quarter. Callahan got his second of the game at 1:48 of the third before Vinnie Visconti’s solo effort was followed by Pat Alviti’s goal with 2.2 seconds left to give the Cougars a commanding 8-3 lead through three quarters.”Austin did all the little things right,” Ritchie said. “Those are the things we still need to improve on.”Dom DiRupo scored early in the fourth before Chris Coito finally stopped the bleeding for the Spartans. The Cougars, however, would close the game with the game’s final five goals.