CUMBERLAND — Kennebunk’s season was at one of its lowest points on May 13, when the Rams lost at home 9-6 to Greely for their only home loss of the season. The Rams sat at 2-4 at the halfway point of their season, but that game also proved to be a turning point. Kennebunk capped off a much better second half of the season on Thursday, as the Rams routed those same Rangers 15-8 at Glenn Hutchins Field in a Western Maine Conference boys lacrosse game.
The Rams (8-4) were riding high entering the game, as they won five-straight games after the mid-season loss to Greely (7-5), including wins in their previous two games over Class B heavyweights Yarmouth and Falmouth. But the regular season finale was a little more personal, as the Rams felt like they had some unfinished business with the Rangers.
“We’ve wanted this so much more since we lost (to them),” said Kennebunk senior co-captain Josh Hussey. “We just worked every day harder in practice.”
“It didn’t settle well with them after the first one, and they wanted it,” said Kennebunk head coach Dan Seavey. “And also I think we’re a much better team now.”
The score backed up Seavey’s claim, as the Rams scored as many goals in the first half (6) as they did in the entire game in the first meeting, and did themselves even better with an eight-goal third quarter.
Kennebunk took control from the start, as Hussey scored 3:27 in on a wraparound shot at the left post.
Fellow senior co-captain Tyler Elkington scored 33 seconds later from the same spot.
“Our gameplan all the time is to come out right off the bat and just put them in, put them in, put them in, and come out firing,” said Seavey. “The guys did a good job of that today, and that really set the tone for the game for our side.”
Sam Doolittle scored 17 seconds later for the Rangers to cut the lead in half, but Patric Murphy scored at the five-minute mark and Hussey scored again to put the Rams up 4-1 at the end of the first quarter.
“It’s a good feeling when you’re ahead and you can keep the ball rolling and keep putting goals in the net,” said Hussey.
Murphy and Jake Boothby scored 16 seconds apart 1:40 in as the Rams pulled further ahead at 6-1, but the Rangers answered with a pair of their own ”“ by Doolittle and Tim Adams ”“ to restore the three-goal deficit at halftime.
Things didn’t stay close for long, as Kennebunk came out firing ”“ literally and figuratively ”“ to start the second half. Elkington scored nine seconds in after Ryan Keefe collected the ball off the faceoff and fed Elkington in front of the net, and he scored again 59 seconds later from Hussey with the Rams two men up.
Boden Beveridge and Hussey each scored before the five-minute mark, prompting Greely coach Michael Storey to call a timeout to try and stop the bleeding.
“I always tell them it’s a new half, a whole new game,” Seavey said of his halftime message. “It’s the same gameplan: come out and put them in the net right off the bat, and honestly we did that.”
Bryce Fraser scored just over six minutes in to make it 11-3 before the Rangers got two back on goals 52 seconds apart. But Kennebunk finished the quarter with three-straight man-up goals ”“ by Boothby, Murphy and Hussey ”“ after sophomore Patrick Gassman was knocked out of the game temporarily by an Alex Kroot hit that was high and from behind, earning Kroot a three-minute penalty.
“Our man-up has come a long, long way, to be honest with you,” said Seavey. “We have a bunch of different looks, and the guys do a very good job at them, and they’re starting to call them on their own; they’re reading defenses.”
“We work a lot on man-up in practice,” said Hussey, “and we just make that our game.”
With the score out of hand, and the emotion injected into the game from both teams, play got chippy, especially in the second half. Kennebunk was more concerned about holding onto the ball and running out the clock than actually scoring, although Ryan Keefe ”“ a hard worker on faceoffs all game ”“ did round out the Rams’ scoring with a goal 15 seconds into the fourth quarter.
“When we lose to big teams like Greely and Falmouth and teams like that, we come back and we fight even harder than before, because we know we need to beat them,” said Hussey. “We feel pretty good. We feel confident just beating these three teams in a row that were really good. It feels good to be where we are, and keep going.”
“You learn a lot from all those games. Really, we started to get our stuff together, and that was really the point, after that game, we turned it around,” Seavey said of the first meeting with Greely. “The kids felt like we should have won that game, and I thought we were the better team. But hey, they got us that time, we got them this time.
“We’re a totally different team now. If you look at our scores at the beginning of the season, watch us play, we’re a totally different team now. We’ve progressed a lot over the last three weeks, four weeks. The guys have really changed it around; we’re clicking good now, things are going well for us.”
— Staff Writer Wil Kramlich can be contacted at 282-1535, ext. 323 or sports@journaltribune.com. Follow him on Twitter @WilTalkSports.
Comments are not available on this story. Read more about why we allow commenting on some stories and not on others.
We believe it's important to offer commenting on certain stories as a benefit to our readers. At its best, our comments sections can be a productive platform for readers to engage with our journalism, offer thoughts on coverage and issues, and drive conversation in a respectful, solutions-based way. It's a form of open discourse that can be useful to our community, public officials, journalists and others.
We do not enable comments on everything — exceptions include most crime stories, and coverage involving personal tragedy or sensitive issues that invite personal attacks instead of thoughtful discussion.
You can read more here about our commenting policy and terms of use. More information is also found on our FAQs.
Show less