LYNN — Saugus boys lacrosse coach Rob Scuzzarella knew coming to Monday’s season opener with Lynn what his team was going to have to do.
“We knew we were going to have to slow things down and control the action,” said Scuzzarella. And that’s exactly what happened.
Saugus was very methodical, which played into the hands of the Lynn defense. But while Saugus slowed things down, Lynn couldn’t take advantage enough to score its own goals.
Thus, Saugus came out on top, 6-4.
“Offense is a problem for us,” said Lynn’s Peter Pappagianopoulos. “Defensively we played great. I’ll take giving up six goals any day of the week. But there isn’t much you can do if you’re only scoring four.”
Saugus came into Manning Field Monday night with only 14 players dressed. Not a lot of kids came out this spring, and a few other players were serving suspensions for violations of school rules, Scuzzarella said.
“I’m proud of the way they hung in there tonight,” he said. “That’s a real big win for us.”
Christian Billingsley scored four of Saugus’ six goals. The other two came from hockey goalie Nick Sanderson and Joe Cross.
In fact, athletes from other sports have helped pick up some of the slack caused by light numbers and ineligible players.
Though defense is a weak spot for Saugus, one of its newest players happens to be senior Ricky Martinez, a standout football player last fall (he won the Lions Club Heisman Award).
“He’s picked it up right away,” said Scuzzarella. “You’d think he always played there. With an inexperienced defense, you need that.”
It was a strange game. Saugus scored three early goals to go up 3-0. But with 1:33 to go in the second quarter Lynn scored three times in rapid succession, by Sam Ennis (one of his two), Quinn Brinkler and John DiFilippo.
“We played well defensively for the whole half,” said Scuzzarella, “but we made three bad turnovers down there at the end of the half, and Lynn did a good job taking advantage of it.”
Pappagianopoulos hoped the outburst would carry over into the second half, but it was to no avail.
Less than two minutes into the third quarter, Billingsley scored again from a shot from 15 yards to the dead center of Lynn goalie Alan Albornoz. Shortly thereafter, Billingsley was back for another, this one from about 20 yards out.
Ennis got his second goal of the night with 5:33 left in the game and it looked on a couple of occasions after that that the Jets tie the game up.
“We hit a lot of legs and heads,” said Pappagianopoulos. “It just wasn’t a good night.”
Any thoughts Lynn might have of gaining a tie were dashed by Billingsley, again, as time ran out.
Pappagianopoulos credited Brian Clougherty and Shidley Belice — the latter on faceoffs.
The Lynners are at home Thursday (5) against Winthrop.
