Lakers Up 2-0 After 10-8 Win Over Brooklin

By Anna Taylor

Photo Credit: Anna Taylor

WHITBY, ON – The Peterborough Century 21 Lakers took a 2-0 series lead in their MSL best-of-seven semifinal series on Saturday night with a 10-8 win over the Brooklin Lacrosse Club at Iroquois Park Sports Centre. 

 

Many Lakers fans made the trip, and their chants and cheers could be heard all game long. Defenseman Colton Armstrong remarked that it nearly felt like a home game, between the noise and the number of people in the stands, many of whom were there to play in the annual Ontario Lacrosse Festival.

Unlike Game 1, where the Lakers led 9-0 before Brooklin scored, 

Peterborough had to work harder for goals on Saturday. They trailed 2-0, 4-2 and 5-4 before finally turning the tide to lead 6-5 after the second period. 

 

“It’s just a great reminder that we are in a series, and we need to get back to playing with lots of energy, and I thought we did that,” said head coach Mike Hasen. “You take the wins as they are.”

 

A pair of goals from Justin Sykes (a healthy scratch in Game 1) 1:39 apart, gave the Lakers their first two-goal lead of the night, which they hung on to and increased to three goals after a pair of late transition markers from Thomas Hoggarth and Matt Gilray.

 

Hoggarth also had a first period goal and two assists to lead the Lakers with four points. Holden Cattoni contributed one goal (scored after an around-the-world pass from Hoggarth) and three assists for four points as well, and Nick Rose made 36 saves. As impressive as those stats are, they’re fairly standard when recapping games. 

 

The true unsung hero of Game 2 was Peterborough’s Robert Hope, who sacrificed his body several times to get in the way of incoming shots to make sure Nick Rose didn’t have to make any extra saves. 

 

“At the end of the day, Hopey does what Hopey does, soaking a lot of shots,” said Hasen.

 

“That guy will take a bullet for any guy on the team,” praised Colton Armstrong. “Every time you look back, he’s standing right in front of Rosey. He obviously is the heartbeat of our team, that’s why he’s the captain and that’s why he’s such a good leader, because of that stuff right there that goes a long way.”

 

Hasen also said that Armstrong had a strong game defensively, and said the team did a lot of good things by committee.

 

“You can point to each of them at some point, they did a real good job each shift.” 

 

Will MacLeod (2G/4A), Sean Westley (2G/3A) and Taggart Clark (3G/2A) led Brooklin on the scoreboard. Zach Higgins was forced to stop 54 shots.

 

Game 2 scratches included Adam Thistlethwaite, Broedie Birkhof, Eric Shewell (suspended one game for fighting Chris Boushy), Brad McCulley and Ben Trumble.

 

Game 3 is at the Memorial Centre on Civic Holiday Monday at 7 p.m. Tickets are now on sale at the box office and fans can use the code “TED” when purchasing tickets to redirect $3 of the purchase price to Parkinson Canada. Game 4 is back in Whitby on Wednesday at 8 p.m. with Game 5, if necessary, Thursday at the Memorial Centre.

 

 

Thomas Hoggarth (2-2)

Justin Sykes (2-1)

Holden Cattoni (1-3)

Braedon Saris (1-2)

Joe Resetarits (1-1)

Taite Cattoni (1-1)

Dustyn Birkhof (1-0)

Matt Gilray (1-0)

Mike Robinson (0-3)

Nick Rose (0-2)

Dylan Hutchison (0-1)