Athletics enter playoffs riding three-game winning streak
St. Catharines lacrosse team wraps up regular season with best record since 2011
The St. Catharines Athletics know they will have home-floor advantage when the Jr. A lacrosse playoffs get underway next week.
What they don’t know is who their opponent will be in the best-of-three quarter-final or where they will finish in the standings when league play wraps up Monday.
Both the 15-3 Burlington Chiefs, with two games in hand, and the 12-3-1 Orangeville Northmen with four games left on their schedule, can finish the regular season with more points than St. Catharines, which sits at 15-5.
The Athletics defeated the Barrie Lakeshores, 12-1, on Wednesday to close out the schedule with three straight wins and their best record since going 16-6 in 2010.
St. Catharines compiled a 9-1 record at home, the lone blemish being a 9-6 setback in overtime to Burlington on May 25.
Tyler Brown, three goals, two assists; John Kit, two goals; Jake McNabb, Kealan Pilon, Alex Simmons, Carter Zavitz, each with one goal, three assists; Liam McDonald, one goal, two assists; Kyle Kilgour, one goal, one assist; and Brayden Mayea, one goal; provided the offence as the A’s completed a sweep of last-place Barrie, 0-17.
St. Catharines outshot the Lakeshores 58-25 before an announced crowd of 384 at Jack Gatecliff Arena.
Nick Damude stopped all 19 shots before being replaced by Austin Paddy, who allowed one goal on five shots the rest of the way,
Barrie finished the game 0-for-3 on the power play; St. Catharines, 1-for-4.
The A’s opened the season series versus the Lakeshores with a 9-1 victory May 31 in Barrie.
One thing that isn’t up in the air is the dominance of the St. Catharines defence this season.
Unless Orangeville can limit opponents to a total of four goals over its final four games, the A’s will finish the season with the lowest goals-against average.
Damude, in 20 games, 1,167.20 minutes; and Paddy, five games, 49.43 minutes; have combined for a 5.35 goals-against average, and a .817 save percentage.
Burlington, 6.17; and Orangeville, 6.38; were second and third, respectively, after Wednesday.
Top point-getters for the A’s in league play: Pilon, 20 games played, 34 goals, 47 assists, 81 points; Zavitz, 18 gp, 21 g, 51 a, 72 pts.; McNabb, 17 gp, 26 g, 33 a, 59 pts.; Simmons, 8 gp, 19 g, 27 a, 46 pts.; Mayea, 16 gp, 18 g, 23 a, 41 pts.
St. Catharines finished over .500 in back-to-back seasons for the first time since stringing together six winning seasons from 2006 to ’11.
Last season, the Athletics returned to the playoffs after a one-year absence and advanced to the second round for the first time since 2008. They swept the Six Nations Arrows before falling to Orangeville in the semifinals.
St. Catharines has won six Minto Cup Canadian junior A lacrosse championships since 1947, the last title coming in 2003. The franchise won back-to-back championships in 1990-91 and also won it all in ’50 and 2001. The last Canadian champion from Ontario was Six Nations. It won its third title in four years in 2017.
St. Catharines finished over .500 in back-to-back seasons for the first time since stringing together six winning seasons from 2006 to ’11.