No surprise; Staples they knew they had X-factor
FAIRFIELD — When asked if he would have been shocked if he had known before the game what the final score would be, Will Koshansky turned and looked over his shoulder at the scoreboard at Sacred Heart University.
“I would have been very happy,” the Staples coach said. “Very, very happy.”
Staples defeated Darien, the No. 1 team in the state and No. 4 in the nation in the latest USA Lacrosse Magazine rankings, for the Class L championship on Sunday.
A surprise, but not a shock.
The 12-3 final? Whoa. A shock?
“No, not at all,” Henry Dodge said. “We are the best team in the state. Nobody is as tight as us. We all love each other to the full extent. That is why the score is that way.”
Even nine goals better than Darien?
“Yeah,” Dodge said. “Yeah.”
History is written by the victors. And in this case the quickest draw in the showdown of FCIAC teams earned the right to grab the pen after his school’s first state lacrosse title.
“Henry Dodge controlled the X,” said Charlie Howard, who scored three goals for Staples.
“Henry Dodge is an unbelievable player,” Koshansky said. “He can do it all. He wins the ball to himself. He wins it to his wings. He handles pressure. He creates offense. He performed today in the biggest moment of the season.”
So much of a lacrosse outcome is decided by faceoffs and Staples controlled possession and thus the game start to finish. In ice hockey, winning faceoffs is important. In lacrosse, winning them is a necessity.
Dodge dominated Sunday. Mike Fornabaio, our Hearst CT lacrosse maven, had him winning 15 of 18 draws. He didn’t lose one cleanly all day.
Dodge didn’t win them against just anyone. He won
them against Tighe Cummiskey, also considered a premier faceoff man.
“They were really fast off the whistle today,” Cummiskey said. “They tracked down ground balls. His wings helped him out a lot. They just had more grit than us today. Dodge was hot today. He got them a lot of possessions.
“I don’t think it was so much the strategy of the draw. They executed better than us. They came ready to play and I don’t think we did.”
Darien barely touched the ball in a first quarter that ended 4-0. The lead expanded to 8-0 before Christian Alliegro finally scored with 5:12 in a first half that ended 9-1. When Darien got its offense going in the third quarter, Staples’ freshman goalie Josh Marcus was stellar.
Darien hadn’t scored fewer than nine goals in a game all season. They got three Sunday.
The lead came close to using running time.
“Start the bus up!” the Staples student section chanted.
And “Over-rated! Overrated!”
Unheard of when it comes to Darien.
“We played almost a perfect game,” Dodge said. “We were firing on all cylinders. It was awesome to see. We had a master key. The key was to play for your brothers. Play like it’s your last game, and it is my last game. It pushed all of us.
“There is a stigma around Darien. They are very talented. One hundred percent there’s a stigma. ‘They’re best in the state.’ Today we proved that wrong. A big part of that is Coach K and our coaching staff changing our mindset from being an average team in the FCIAC to a champion mindset.”
Dodge, headed to play at Vermont, was first-team
FCIAC. His friend and former Staples player Dobson Cooper, who recently graduated from Vermont, told him playing there was the best decision he made in his life. So UVM it is. Cummiskey, headed to Lafayette, was second-team FCIAC.
When it beat Staples 15-10 on April 28, Darien erased a two-goal lead with four goals in the final 5:24 of the third quarter. Cummiskey went 7-2 in the X in that quarter.
“Tighe is a very, very good faceoff man,” Koshansky said. “Henry was just better today. We worked a ton in our preparation. We knew that in the regular-season game against them, Henry would win the clamp, but we didn’t necessarily get all those possessions.
“We talked about selling out for ground balls on the wings, that those ground balls would be critical. I took a couple of timeouts there to get possession off faceoffs. We know how valued every possession would be.”
The core of this lacrosse team is the same core that led Darien to the state championship in football. Matthew Minicus. Joe Cesare. Cummiskey. David Evanchick. Alliegro. Jeremiah Stafford. Jake Wilson. Finn Pokorny. Alec Medwar. These are familiar names that finished No. 1 in the GameTimeCT poll, a fate that seemed to await them again with a potential 15th state lacrosse title under Jeff Brameier. It didn’t happen.
“It’s a great feeling to win a state championship,” Cummiskey said. “Transposed, it’s not a great feeling to walk away from one. You got to put more out on the field. A lot of guys could have put more out there today — including myself.”
This has been a painful spring at Darien. Three athletes died, including Matthew McEvoy of the lacrosse team. In a difficult moment, Cummiskey stood tall answering questions.
“It has been very difficult,” Cummiskey said. “We’ve had a lot guys impacted. It also
gave us something to play for. Lacrosse is a safe haven for a lot of guys this year. It has been hard to battle through, but we’ve been there for each other. We are a team. We are a family. And that’s the most important thing.”
Cummiskey was the ultimate finisher in football. He ran for 1,877 yards, 144.4 per game, and scored 23 touchdowns. Darien got the lead. Cummiskey grounded opponents into submission and grinded the game clock to 0:00. He broke tackles. He broke hearts right down to the 42-7 state title rout of Fairfield Prep.
He was the one who got Cummiskey’d on this day.
Dodge’s teammate Ryan Thompson came right out and called Dodge the best faceoff guy in the nation.
“All season I’ve been compared to (Cummiskey), saying he’s on my level,” Dodge said. “I loved being able to prove that wrong completely. I love being able to say we are the best team and nobody is on our level.”
Dodge has concentrated fully on lacrosse. He works year-round, he said, for “a moment like this.” He studies video. He works on moves and countermoves. He plays with the Eclipse Lacrosse Club. A handful of those familiar Darien players do also.
“They’ve been my teammates,” Dodge said. “I love them all. I feel bad for them.”
Dodge also wanted to beat them.
“We had a long memory about Ridgefield,” said Dodge, referring to the state semifinal victory over Ridgefield after having its 2021 season ended by the Tigers. “We have an even longer memory about Darien.
“They beat us in the FCIAC finals last year, 15-3. It wasn’t 15-3 that we were hoping for today, but I’m so proud of my boys. They played their hearts out all season. They did everything right today.”