Above – Chandler Harrison with a save photo by Kacia Platt Some of Georgia’s premier teams visited Lake Mary High School for the first annual Florida/Georgia Showdown brought to you by OrlandoLacrosse.com and they made the most of their time in the Sunshine State.  Centennial (9-1 coming into the weekend), Northview (8-3), Lambert (8-2), and Milton (3-7) spent Friday and Saturday at Lake Mary High School taking on Barron Collier, Lake Mary, Plant, Gulf Coast, and Timber Creek High School.

These schools represent some of the best in Georgia. Northview won the A-AAAAA State Championship last season and Centential was the AAAAAA Champion in 2013.  Lambert and Milton were champions in their respective divisions in 2012.  These four teams have combined for six Divisional State Championships in the last five years.  This is a pretty stout group of lacrosse programs. The games began on 11:00 Friday on the field turf at Lake Mary as the Rams played host to Lambert.  Jake Stanford got the Longhorns out early with a big shot and Hunter Shepherd followed that up when he picked up a lose ball on a busted clear and scored in the open net. It was almost eight minutes into the game when Lake Mary finally got on the board with a nice shot from Garrett Gile after he hit the right alley and shot low to the far post.  The margin was at a single goal for only a few seconds, however, as Matt O’roark hit Grant Plaugher to make it 3-1 right off the face off.  Face Offs would become part of the story as Lambert controlled the X for most of the game.

The Rams made something happen early in the second quarter as they got a face off win and worked hard.  They turned it over once but earned a second chance opportunity with a tremendous ride and Garrett Gile scored his second of the game on a 3/4 bouncer from way outside to make it 3-2.  But on the next face off the Lambert wingmen outworked the Rams to get a possesion.  Jake Stanford made the most of it with the cannon from outside and stretched it back out to 4-2. With the first half winding down Eric Overbay  scored with a simple move across the top and fired a low bouncer that beat the goalie to give Lambert a 5-2 lead with :24 left in the half.  But Zach Gussman wasn’t finished with the half.  He made a couple of dodges and refused to quit on the play and was able to get a good shot off as time expired in the half to make it 5-3 and give the Rams some positive energy to take into the halftime. The Rams drew a slash call on the opening face off of the second half to give Lake Mary’s extra man offense a chance to bring the game back to within a goal.  The chances improved when a second flag on Lambert extended the EMO and gave them a 2 man advantage for a few seconds.  Alex Forehand took a pass from Gussman and was able to finish to take advantage of the EMO and bring the game to 5-4.

The teams traded possesions and solid defensive efforts for the next four minutes until Gussman took a pass from Kurt Sisco and tied the game up with 7:30 left in the third.  Over the next six minutes, however, Lambert would make a three goal run scoring two extra man goals and Jake Stanford completed his hat trick putting Lambert out in front 8-5 before Lake Mary could answer. Forehand would score another for Lake Mary but Lambert would come back with a pair of goals from Grant Plaugher and Matt O’Rourk to put this one out of reach and give Lambert the 10-6 victory and the first of seven wins for Georgia in the showdown. The next game up was Centennial vs Plant, a game which featured a pair of Army Commits, Zach Leavy for Centennial and Bennett Taylor for Plant.  The Centennial roster also boasts brothers Nate (Syracyse-SR) and Nicky (North Carolina-FR) Solomon who are a high scoring pair of D1 commits who would end the day with some pretty impressive numbers.   Nate, for his part, has been putting up huge numbers his whole career.  We spoke to his head coach, Bryan Wallace, about a milestone Nate is closing in on, “Nate Solomon needs five points to pass Casey Powell in total points.  He has 548 career points, only the 11th high school player in history to score over 500 points.”

Nate ended this game with 5 goals and 5 assists.  Nicky Solomon scored 2 goals an 9 assists.   Zach Leavy would show that he is much more than just a FOGO by scoring 7 goals and going 18 for 24 at the face off X. Plant’s freshman goalie impressed us with his poise despite the big number being put up by Centennial.  The Knights are loaded, physical, and patient and work to get the ball inside. Most shots coming from very close.  But Jack Schifino played well, made some good saves, and stayed tall throughout the game.  Jackson Misner played well for Plant as did Enrique Marnotes, junior middie for Plant. The final score was Centennial 22 Plant 6. The third game of the day pitted former Georgia State Champ Milton against Barron Collier.  Milton entered the weekend at 3-7 and they may be down somewhat this year, but it is a strong team and a solid program.  Certainly the most well rounded, fast, and skilled 3-7 team I can remember seeing.  Barron Collier is number 11 in the FLN Media Poll and number 10 in our Al Packer Ford Coaches Poll.  Two good teams that did not disappoint us.

BC won the opening face off and Jake Tilitz scored unassisted to give Collier the 1-0 lead early.  But senior Jackson Anderson came right back for Milton taking a pass from Charlie Gallagher in an unsettled situation to tie it up and draw a flag.   That Barron Collier man down unit would stand up against the EMO and keep the score tied.  Zach Woods is a fantastic goalie and through out the first quarter the Barron Colliers pressure zone kept Milton to the outside for the most part, but they were able to get inside a couple of times and Woods came up big. Charlie Gallager took a shot from outside at the top and scored with :30 left in the quarter to give Milton a 2-1 advantage and BC came right back and had a great chance with just a few seconds left in the quarter but the Griffin Basile in the goal for Milton stoned it. The second quarter was as close as it gets with both teams trading blows throughout the quarter.  First it was Barron Collier’s Drew Goodrich who scored to tie it up at 2. Shortly after that  Alex Brown scored to make it 3-2 and the Milton offense was beginning to work.  Milton then got the ball down to Charlie Gallager who just backed up on his defender and pushed his way up to the island and scored to make it 4-2.

Then it was BC’s turn as Drew Goodrich took a feed from Jake Telitz after both teams traded some good long possesions to make it 4-3. He then came back quickly and scored his second goal in under two minutes to tie up. Drew Goodrich was showing great leadership out there and playing very determined lacrosse. Luke Jenkins put Milton back out front with a huge shot from the left wing.  With time running out and both teams playing hard we had pair of busted clears by each team and some very physical play led to a slash call against Barron Collier with :03 left in the half.  Big advantage for Milton as they would now start the second half with the ball and the EMO. BC was able to kill the penalty but 25 seconds after it expired that pressure zone of the Cougars lost track of Hunter Graham and Luke Jenkins found him all alone in the middle and they converted to make it 5-3.

It turned into one flag after another against BC and they found themselves two goals and two men down.  What could have been a game changing EMO for Milton turned into a disaster for them and a pivotal time for BC.  A fast break was created when one of the two men released uncovered out of the box just as Barron Collier made a save. Zach Woods found Nash Oluwek free and clear and hit him in stride.  Oluwek got the ball down low and it was converted by Connor McGraw. Milton was still one man up but disaster struck a second time as Jake Telitz scored another man down goal to tie it up. The Eagles certainly didn’t quit and junior Colin Beecham fired a huge ripper high to high and gave Milton a 7-6 lead. Alex Brown followed that one up quickly to make it 8-6 as he took a great feed from Jackson Anderson on the play. Barron Collier defenseman Sam Hoover picked up the ball near midfield and ran a fast break right to the pipes and dumped the ball to Jonah Nash who made the Canadian style shot to make it 8-7 with 2:40 left in the third. Nash was on a roll and found himself in the right place at the right time as Telitz would lose the ball on a dodge and it went straight to him and he wasted no time finishing to tie it up at 8.

The fourth quarter started with the teams still knotted at 8 when Sean Mahoney, the young face off specialist for Barron Collier won the face off and fired a shot wide.  Sean Nash took the ball from the restart and sprinted up to the island and  scored to put Barron Collier out front only seconds into the fourth. Milton followed it up with a cross check penalty and Connor McGraw made good on the EMO with a nice pass from Goodrich and BC was up 10-8.  Connor McGraw would score two more on the day to end with four goals, one on a EMO and yet another short handed goal to give BC the 12-8 victory in what would be the only Florida win on the weekend. Georgia’s defending State Champs, Northview, took on Gulf Coast in the final game of the day.  With the loss of Sterling Desorcy to an ACL before the season even began and the subsequent loss of their starting goalie I wasn’t expecting Gulf Coast to have the manpower to hang with the defending Champs.  But I was wrong. Gulf Coast was able to hang tough with Northview .  They matched up well and played to a 2-1 first quarter giving up the go ahead goal on a late EMO.  The Elgin brothers, Austin Miller, and Bo Garrison are not about to give anything away. In the second quarter Gulf Coast came out fast with Bo Garrison scoring quickly and the Gulf Coast defense playing well and not giving up anything easy.  Northview was having to work for everything they got and most players who tried to dodge inside ended up on the ground. Gulf Coast just looked like a team whose season had not gone the way the had planned and they were tired of it.  They were firing shots from all angles and had the Northview defense on their heels for much of the second quarter. Northview took advantage of a rare second chance opportunity when they picked up an offensive GB and finished quickly on the unsettled opportunity to take a 3-2 lead. They came back with three more to keep a four goal run going to make it 6-2 at the half. Coming out in the second half Gulf Coast was really working hard and forced a couple of turnovers and drew a flag. The Sharks converted on the EMO making it 6-3.  As the setting sun looked to be shining directly into the eyes of the Northview goalie, Luke Curran fired one in to make it 6-4.  Bo Garrion took the face off straight down the right alley and scored another Gulf Coast goal to cap a three goal run for the sharks to make it 6-5 with 5:24 left in the third quarter. It took a while for the Northview offense to get going again but with just 1:41 left in the third quarter Chase Hicks got his hat trick to make it 7-5.  Just over a minute into the fourth quarter Owen Perrine scored on a pass from Matty Biondich to put Northview up by three.  But Luke Curran won the face-off for Gulf Coast and got the goal right back make it 8-6. Trammell Lovingood finished on transition with an assist from Matt Reny to make it 9-6.  Curran scored yet again for Gulf Coast to make it 9-7. The play of the game took place when Matt Kuhlke took an underhanded shovel shot from 10 yards out and hit the top right corner to make it 10-7 with 5:46 in the game.  Two minutes later Austin Miller took a feed from X as he was in a great position on the wing and ripped a hard shot to make it 10-8 but that would be as close as the sharks could get.  Northview held on to win the game and give Georgia a 3-1 record on day one of the showdown.