Stone boys lax loses to Calvert
On a dark, cloudy and rainy Wednesday afternoon, Calvert’s offense shined brightly as the host Cavaliers rolled to a 22-2 win over Thomas Stone in a Class 3A-2A East Region Section II quarterfinal game.
The fourth-seeded Cavaliers (8-7 overall) will travel to Northern on Friday to face the top-seeded Patriots in a Section II semifinal game.
“We know it’s going to be a tough game,” Calvert head coach Cliff Hunsicker said, “and hopefully we’ll be a little more competitive against the top team in the SMAC.”
SMAC champion Northern defeated its county rivals to the south Calvert 16-2 in a regular season game on April 26.
“We have the talent, the experience to be able to keep up,” Calvert senior attack Alexander Osburn said. “We just have to keep our passes up and our throwing game good, and I think if we hustle, we can stay with them.”
Calvert wasted no time jumping on the board against Stone when Bryce Stargel scored off a fast break 13 seconds into the opening quarter. Robert Harris and junior varsity call-up Caleb Hostetler later added goals 12 seconds apart to put the Cavaliers ahead 3-0 and they never looked back.
Calvert held an 11-0 lead after the first quarter and a 16-2 advantage at halftime.
Isaiah Roberts and Kevin Curtis led the attack with five goals each and Connor Glea- son finished with three goals. Jordan Jalloh scored twice and Hostetler, Stargel, Hunter Sloan, Ian Healey, Connor Ficke, Andrew Jones and Robert Harris each added singles.
The Cougars (2-12) received two goals from Nicholas DiGiovannantonio. Stone also played three goalies.
“They overpowered us athletically and in sheer numbers,” Stone head coach Adam Lowe said. “We came out and played hard, but athletically those guys just have way more experience than we have.”
The Cougars finished the season with five straight losses.
“From March 1 to now the kids played hard,” Lowe said. “I think this is the first time in eight years I’ve had no kids quit. Everybody stayed the whole season, everybody played tough so it’s one of the best groups of guys I’ve had.”
“It was a really fun season; it didn’t turn out as well record-wise but team-wise everyone got along and worked really well together,” DiGiovannantonio said. “It was a lot of fun to play with these guys in my last season. Our goalie Troy [Robinson] got 10 times better than he was and with a little encouragement from the team he played great, Rasaun [Breaux] was new and all these new players we had from football and basketball [went from] not knowing how to cradle to starting, so it was a really good season in that case.”