Lake Mary rolls, Winter Park falls in state semis
The Lake Mary boys lacrosse team is one win away from a perfect season.
The Rams (23-0) dominated in a 16-6 win over Tampa Plant (16-6) on Thursday in a FHSAA Class 2A state semifinal at the Paradise Coast Sports Complex in Naples.
Junior midfielder Caden Harshbarger and junior attacker Riley Turner each had 4 goals in the victory.
Lake Mary will play the first championship game in program history on Saturday.
The Rams will face St. Thomas Aquinas (17-3) of Fort Lauderdale in the FHSAA Class 2A state championship game at noon at the complex.
The Raiders beat Winter Park 15-6 in their semifinal matchup.
“We still got work to do,“Lake Mary coach Gary Robinson said to the Sentinel. “We’re focused. We’re way past the happy to be here thing, we’re here to win, and I think that was evident in how we came out today.”
Aquinas is the defending state champion and also won Florida High School Athletic Association titles in 2016 and 2017. The Raiders were runner-up in 2015 and 2019.
“They both have a lot of horses, a lot of depth, guys in the right spots,“Winter Park coach Ryan Healey said after his team’s loss. “It should be a phenomenal final game.”
Winter Park (18-4) played Lake Mary in the regular season, losing 8-5.
Lake Mary, ranked No. 1 in the South by USA Lacrosse Magazine, led 6-1 at the end of the first quarter and 11-2 at halftime.
Four of the Rams’ five postseason victories are by 10 goals or more – the exception being last week’s 6-5 region final win against Ponte Vedra.
“More patience and ball movement,“Robinson said in comparing that win with Thursday’s. “We played a much more intelligent game.”
Aquinas outscored Winter Park 8-1 in the second half to pull away.
“They came out and got two quick on us, and it was 9-5,“Healey said. “They won almost every single face-off, we won three or four face-offs. They obviously had possessions, a couple of calls that didn’t go our way kind of changed the momentum a little bit, and quickly it went from a 9-5 to 10-5 to 11-5. We fell behind kind of quick, and lacrosse is a game of runs. And unfortunately, we had some bad luck go our way.“
Winter Park had 15 seniors on its team.
“A lot of them played varsity their freshman year,“Healey said. “I’ve been involved in the program for 23 years, and I think it’s the best senior class that’s ever come through.”