Carroll unable to catch up to Southern Lehigh

EMMAUS — Archbishop Carroll was coming up on 22 minutes without a goal Friday afternoon when Sean Kearney found a shooting lane and scored, leaving them somehow down just three goals to Southern Lehigh.

Three minutes later, when Fynn bounced in his second straight goal, deflecting home an Andy Borkowski shot hockey-style, the Patriots were within two.

“There’s a feeling of belief,” said. “We wanted to keep rolling and rolling, but their faceoff guy is good. Our defense was playing well, had a couple of opportunities to get goals, but we were getting stuffed. We didn’t come up with the win.”

’s goal would be the last one that the Patriots put on the board, with Southern Lehigh firing home the game’s final seven tallies in a 14-5 win in the thrice-postponed opening round of the PIAA Class 2A tournament at Emmaus High School.

The victory sends the District 11 champion Spartans to Saturday’s quarterfinal against District 1 juggernaut Bishop Shanahan at a site and time to be determined.

The District 12 runner-up Patriots (13-9) were in position to keep the game interesting. Despite being blanked in the second quarter and going 21 minutes, 56 seconds without a goal, Kearney’s marker put them behind just 6-3. But it also seemed to wake up Southern Lehigh.

Faceoff man Ben Linden hit back within seven seconds to restore a four-goal bump. halved the deficit with goals at 6:22 and 4:20 of the third quarter, and Carroll went on a man-advantage a minute later with a chance to trim the spread to one.

But they failed to get a shot off and squandered possession, leading to a Michael Smith goal on the other end, then a turned-over clear in the final minute that allowed Kenneth Wolfe to rifle a shot from the midway line with six seconds left and goalie Vince Tarasca having strayed from his crease.

The Spartans scored all five goals in the fourth, with Carroll never quite able to recover.

The fourth in particular favored the Spartans’ patient passing, looking for opportunities to exploit. They were 2-for-4 on the day on man-up chances and ran many of their extended possessions like man-ups, valuing motion and spacing.

“We try to control the ball most of the game,” Smith said. “We have a strong faceoff guy, and we don’t want to let our defense get tired, and we want to tire out the other defense.”

Linden went 12-for-21 at the X, and a strong defense meant goalie Garrett Schlosser only had to make three saves on the day.

Smith led the way with five goals and an assist. Troy Scozzafava paired two goals with three assists, Cooper Nelson scored two goals and two assists, and Wolfe added two goals and a helper. Max Johnston and Kyle Hoff had a goal and an assist each.

“Our offense runs off of getting defenses moving,” Smith said. “Sometimes when we struggle drawing slides, sometimes we’ll have to put in a new plan. But other than that, we’re usually fine.”

The damage could’ve been worse had 13 of the Spartans’ 30 shots not missed the cage, with Tarasca making just three saves.

Kearney scored twice, and Max Ritter added the other goal, the opener 47 seconds in to give Carroll its only lead. Leading scorers Zane Walsh and Borkowski were held in check.

Much has changed since Carroll’s states berth last year, a loss to York Catholic in the first round. They have a new head coach, with Brian Santoleri taking over, and have adapted to life without All-Delco midfielder Adam Ritter. Making states for a second straight year has enshrined it as the annual goal for the program, and turning it into a streak is an accomplishment the Patriots take to heart.

“It’s very important to keep the standard up to going to states every year,” said. “Hopefully we can get there next year. We’ve got a lot of upperclassmen staying, a lot of incoming freshmen that are good, and hopefully we can make it to states next year.”