Delco’s lacrosse dominance on full district display Thursday

It’s long been beyond doubt, but in case the point needed reinforcing, this year’s District 1 tournaments have provided it. Eight teams will compete for championships Thursday evening at two sites in West Chester; five hail from Delco.

On the heels of last spring, when three Delco teams were crowned state champions, that level of success should come as no surprise. But the variety of this year’s class sets it apart.

The marquee matchup is in the girls Class 3A tournament, where top-seeded Garnet Valley and No. 2 Springfield meet. Springfield ousted the Jaguars, 12-8, in last year’s 3A semifinal on the way to a runner-up performance in both districts and states. Garnet Valley exacted revenge in the regular season with a 10-8 win, part of its march to the Central League title.

The two teams are immensely similar, with deep attacking contingents which usually resist being slowed by a defense bottling up one primary threat. Garnet Valley started slow in Tuesday’s semifinal but eventually overcame Perkiomen Valley, 10-8. It took a Belle Mastropietro goal in overtime for Springfield to dismiss No. 3 Unionville, 10-9.

“We’re excited,” Garnet midfielder Camryn McNeal said. “We need to play our game, focus on the basics and the little things.”

Then there are the repeat champions in the Class 2A finals, two programs that defy the idea that the smaller class is in any way the lesser one. The Springfield boys aim for their second straight District 1 crown and third consecutive state crown, with top-seeded Bishop Shanahan standing in the way.

The Cougars (16-2) navigated a game effort by Radnor in a 9-5 win Tuesday. For all the past success, Springfield is anything but sated.

“We’re still hungry,” midfielder Jack Spence said Tuesday. “Coach always preaches it. We have to keep on fighting. This group right here, we haven’t won anything yet. This is about our class’s legacy.”

Radnor’s girls team is likewise eager to continue its dynasty against top-seeded Villa Maria in the 2A final. The No. 2 Raiders (16-4) won the last unified district title in 2016, then romped past all comers in the field last year on the way to a 2A state title.

This team is much different than last year’s veteran-laden Raiders, which gives the younger generations a chance to prove themselves anew.

“Last season we had 10 seniors, so at the beginning of this season no one really had any expectations for us,” attackman Cate Cox said. “That’s why I think we’ve worked so hard trying to get this team to the next level. … We just tried to worry about each game as we were playing it, and the younger girls we have on this team have really stepped up to the plate. When districts started, it was all about getting to states. Now it’s about giving a good effort (Thursday) and going on for the next two weeks.”

For Radnor and Springfield’s boys, the accomplishments of the past create expectations for the future, and no one wants to fall short of the lofty standards of bygone generations.

“I think you’re almost hungrier than ever because you’ve got a legacy to keep going,” Springfield senior attackman Kyle Long said. “No one wants to be that senior class that didn’t get to states or didn’t make a run into June. I think this group has really bought in to working harder than ever, and I think we say that every year. After 2016, I think we worked even harder, and 2017 and 2018, we’ve worked harder than that.”

This year’s Delco contingent even includes a Cinderella story in Garnet Valley’s boys. The No. 15 seed in Class 3A, the Jaguars (14-8) have knocked off three top-10 seeds to land an unlikely states berth and a date with No. 4 seed and Central League champ Conestoga in Thursday’s final.

The biggest challenge, Garnet coach Frank Urso said, is having a young team believe in itself. Expectations were modest this season after the graduation of three Division I offensive stars in Jacob Buttermore, Denny Nealon and ACC Freshman of the Year Matt Moore. Those squads fell short of states the last three years, and Urso has known since the summer that his team expected this to muddle through a down year with diminished overall talent. But a surge in confidence has coincided with their renaissance on the field, and Garnet Valley is proving to be greater than the sum of its parts.

“If you look at a lot of the games we lost, we evaluated, did we get beat or did we lose the game?” Urso said. “And in a lot of cases, we just made so many young mistakes. We were beating us. The key was convincing them that they were good enough to win, to beat people, but only if we eliminated the number of mistakes we were making.”

It’s the small details that create winning performances. Patient offensive possessions that stretch more than a minute instead of a hasty 20 seconds. Fewer unforced errors, like risky passes in transition. And it doesn’t hurt that goalie Jason Rose is saving more than 70 percent of the shots he’s faced this postseason, an astronomical percentage, behind a young but talented defense.

That’ll come in hand against Conestoga, which outlasted Avon Grove in three overtimes Tuesday night in a rematch of last year’s PIAA Class 3A final. Conestoga won the regular-season encounter, 10-6. But that was a different Garnet Valley team.

“This team plays like it has a chip on its shoulder,” Urso said. “It’s fighting every possession. They’ve really come together and now they believe in themselves.”