WATERBORO — Back in the spring of 2010, Massabesic boys lacrosse coach Mark Levesque found himself in need of a new starting midfielder a few games into the season.

Lacking any experienced hands to turn to, Levesque decided to take a chance on a freshman with plenty of speed but only a year of the sport under his belt.

That rookie ”“ Jake Desrochers ”“ turned out to be the right choice, scoring three goals in his first-ever varsity game.

“Coached tried me out at starting and I was able to put in a goal and help out the team,” Desrochers said of that first game. “And ever since I’ve been starting varsity.”

Desrochers has been a mainstay on the Mustangs midfield line since, scoring 21 goals his sophomore year and again leading the team in scoring a year ago, when he was one of just two underclassmen to make the SMAA All-Conference first team.

Now heading into his senior season, Desrochers is what Levesque simply calls “My go-to guy.”

“He can shoot left, he can shoot right. He can play good defense, he’s a heck of a middie, he’s our faceoff guy, he’s up and down the field ”“ he does everything for us,” Levesque said. “He’s really an all-around player for me. Without him this year, we’d be hurting.”

While Desrochers has developed into a multitalented player that SMAA defenses have to game plan around, it didn’t just happen. Having only started playing in the eighth grade, Desrochers was still extremely raw after his freshmen year ”“ and he knew it.

Instead of resting on his laurels, as some freshmen that had secured a spot in a varsity lineup might have, Desrochers spent the majority of the following summer working on left-handed stick skills so that teams couldn’t just push him to his right and effectively shut him down.

“He asked me if he could borrow a couple nets that summer,” Levesque said. “That’s what he did all summer. He just wanted to be a better lacrosse player.

“Now, more teams try to push him from the left, and I tell them he’s really a righty and they say ”˜No way.’ He shoots better left because he practices it so much.”

The indispensable role that Desrochers plays showed up in last year’s Western Maine quarterfinal against Thornton Academy, when he scored three of the Mustangs’ four goals in a one-goal loss to the Golden Trojans, a game that 10 months later he hasn’t forgotten about.

“It was a heartbreaker. We hit a pipe in the last 30 seconds,” Desrochers said. “But if we can make playoffs this year I think we’ll have a better outcome. We want it and I think with the team we have this year we can do it.”

Getting back into the playoffs could be a tough task for Massabesic after losing 18 seniors from last year’s squad. That’s added another helping on to Desrochers’ plate that he hasn’t had to deal with before: leadership.

“We did lose a lot of kids on our varsity team from last year,” Desrochers said. “But I definitely feel like those of us who are returning have everything on our shoulders and are really stepping up our game to help out the underclassmen.

“I feel like everything else is going to be put on our shoulders during game time and we’ll have to come through.”

So far, like with everything else, Levesque said Desrochers is coming through in his role as mentor.

“He’s being a leader and I really need that out of him with such a young squad this year,” Levesque said. “I’ve needed him to step up to start proving to them that they have to learn to shoot left. They think they can shoot one-handed to be good.

“He’s trying to teach them and he’s been awesome.”

— Staff Writer Cameron Dunbar can be contacted at 282-1535, Ext. 323.