Boys lacrosse: Proud, York take win from Barrington

Early Thursday afternoon, York attackman Harrison Proud gave his team the lead against a feisty Barrington squad.

Late, he gave the Dukes insurance.

All that effort helped host York boys lacrosse team defeat the Broncos 10-6 and improve to 4-1 this season.

Proud, a junior, scored two in a row to start the game, including taking a rebound from a shot from the left side at 7:22 and putting the ball in the back of the net. The other, at 10:09, was a shot down the right side of dead center, where the ball was deposited up top.

But with the Dukes up seemingly comfortably midway through the fourth quarter at 7-3, the Broncos erupted, getting 3 straight goals in the space of a little more than three minutes to cut that lead to 7-6.

The prettiest of that sequence was a shot midfielder Nathan Nguyen buried into the left corner of the net at 5:09 after curling up from the right side. Forty seconds later, he scored again on basically the same play.

That put York in a bit of a pickle, but after sophomore attackman Ryan Woolfe scored at 4:18, it was Proud who put the game out of reach at 3:37. Woolfe beat his man around the left backside of the net and passed to a wide open Proud who was point blank on the right side.

"I think we did a really good job of opening the field and we were making quick passes and moving the ball and making the defense slide and we were looking for the extra man," Proud said. "I think we did a good job on those plays."

Sure, that last one was an important goal, but the first two were more so, he said.

"Oh, it's super important," he said. "You want to show them you're bringing the energy and setting the tempo as well. You don't want the other team to set the tempo."

Proud wasn't alone. Senior attackman John McGovern also had a hat trick, while Woolfe had a pair. But senior goaltender Joey Cornell had a solid second quarter with four big saves against the shooting of Nguyen and attackman Kevin Twohig.

The most crucial was with 9:33 to go in the half and York down two men. Nguyen blasted a wide-open shot from the right from 10 yards out and Cornell deflected it away. It was one of his 7 saves on the day.

"We were on 'D' for about five or six minutes maybe, and when you're two men down, usually the other team is going to score," Cornell said. "No. 17, their big shooter got off a shot and it hit off my knee and redirected."

It was a missed opportunity for Barrington (1-2) but Twohig picked his team up by grabbing a loose ball and depositing it into the net with 2:42 remaining, cutting the York lead to 4-2.

Nguyen had a hat trick for the Broncos, while Twohig had a pair and midfielder Tommy Feeney added another with 2:56 left in the third quarter on a shot from about 12 yards out into the upper center of the net.

"They're both juniors and returning varsity guys," Barrington coach Jason Kaiser said of Nguyen and Twohig, "They are savvy players, they are field-aware. It takes a lot to put the passing together to work it around and make plays, and they are told to be patient, and at times they kind of have to push.

"We did that when we had to, and we kind of leaned when they found their own times to push."

Barrington won the faceoff battle 9-8, but York outshot the Broncos 28-23.