La Salle erases early 5-goal deficit, pulls away in 2nd half to beat St. Joseph’s Prep

SPRINGFIELD >> It was all St. Joseph’s Prep early in Friday night’s matchup against fellow Philadelphia Catholic League boys lacrosse heavyweight La Salle.

The Hawks scored the only two goals of the opening quarter then kept their offense rolling, extending their lead to 5-0 in the second quarter after back-to-back tallies from Luke Bieberbach.

But Jack Vandegrift finally broke through for the Explorers off a pass from Leyton Bracken. Another two from Stevie Davis followed and before heading into halftime La Salle completely flipped the momentum of the contest at Flannery Field.

The Explorers never gave it back.

La Salle were level with the Hawks at five at the break then with Bracken orchestrating the offense from the X position behind the net, the home side continued its run, scoring all five goals in the second half to pull away and top the Hawks 10-5.

“We kind of just fought adversity,” Bracken said. “We went in the huddle, our coach was like we got to get out there and just push the ball and just do our sets and be patient. I think we settled down, it was big game, a lot of crowd, I think we were just overwhelmed. Settled down, did our offense, started moving the ball, taking the best shot and it worked out for us.”

Bracken finished with six assists – the senior dishing out a pair in the first half then collecting the helper on the first four goals after intermission. Vandegrift and Steve Davis both scored three times while JV Faliveno added two second-half goals as the Explorers (6-3, 5-0 PCL) earned their sixth straight win.

“I think our first and second goal we realized we had a really big shot to come back,” Davis said. “We’ve been there before, we’ve been down before and we’ve come back. I would say sometimes we have slow starts but we know we’re confident in our team and our guys to come back and play well.”

Bieberbach paced the Prep (4-3, 2-1) with two goals, his second coming on as he ripped in a shot from up top to have the Hawks flying high at 5-0. Vandegrift, however, got La Salle on the scoreboard while Davis cut the margin to three off a feed from Dylan Malone. Davis then made it 5-3 charging in to open space in front of the net.

“I knew we were down, we needed some momentum, we needed some goals,” said Davis, a junior midfielder and faceoff specialist verbally committed to Penn. “And definitely just took it to the cage and thought it might get the team juiced.”

Vandegrift found Nole Henry to pull La Salle within 5-4 while Leyton connected with a cutting Vandegrift to knot things at five going into halftime.

“In the second quarter, after we scored our third goal, we just had a lot of momentum and our offense was clicking,” said Bracken, who is committed to Lynn University in Boca Raton, Florida. “We were finally being patient, finding the best opportunity, best shot and it worked for us. We started pushing transition, starting doing better on the defensive side clearing, everything like that. I think we just came together and just started fixing everything up, just got the best out of it.”

Vandergrift gave La Salle the lead for good with a slick bit of skill, the senior attacker committed to Mount St. Mary’s taking a pass from Leyton in front then sending a back-the-back shot into the bottom of the net.

“Jack Vandegrift’s one of my best friends, me and him have a really good chemistry,” Bracken said. “And when he put away that behind-the-back off the feed it was awesome, definitely brightened the whole entire arena and our team went wild. So definitely was a momentum boost and definitely put us right over the edge.”

Faliveno tallied his first off a Bracken assist to make it 7-5 at 7:49 in the third quarter and the score stayed that way until the fourth as Bracken, from behind the net, found Davis up top and the junior rifled in a long-range effort for a three-goal advantage.

“We started cutting down more to the ball, I started looking up, not forcing, just being more patient,” Bracken said. “We started getting the ball around two or three times – find the best shot, best opportunity and it definitely worked out for us.

“In the first half, we didn’t really have a lot of opportunities, we were having trouble moving the ball, everything like that and we started clicking on all cylinders and it finally worked out for us. And we started pushing the ball and we just clicked, it was awesome.”

Bracken collected his final assist on a Faliveno goal while Darryl Kuriger capped the Explorers’ 10-0 run off a pass from Paul van Bastelaar.

Both teams stay in the PCL for their next games. La Salle hosts Conwell-Egan 4:30 p.m. Wednesday while St. Joe’s Prep faces Roman Catholic 4 p.m. Tuesday at the Kroc Center in Philadelphia.

“It definitely is a confidence boost, makes us happy to beat our rival but we’re still going to work hard, still go back to practice, work our butts off,” Davis said. “And we know we’re going to face Prep again in the playoffs – great team, well coached, it’s going to be a battle the next time we see them but we’re just going to move forward, keep doing what we do and just play lacrosse and just try to win.”

Will McConaghy gave St. Joseph’s Prep a 1-0 lead at 7:34 in the first quarter with the Hawks going up 2-0 with just 9.9 seconds left in the period as Teddy Fenlin finished in transition off a Grant Snyder assist.

Anthony Laber posted the first tally of the second quarter to make it 3-0 Prep before Bieberbach collected the next two to push the visitors lead to five.

La Salle 10, St. Joseph’s Prep 5
St. Joseph’s Prep 2 3 0 0 – 5
La Salle 0 5 2 3 – 10
Goals: SJP-Luke Bieberbach 2, Teddy Fenlin, Anthony Laber, Will McConaghy; L-Stevie Davis 3, Jack Vandegrift 3, JV Faliveno 2, Nole Henry, Darryl Kuriger.