It’s quite a lineup, folks:
* Chaminade at West Islip, 1 p.m.
* John Jay at Yorktown, 1 p.m.
* Somers at St. Anthony’s, 2 p.m.
Together, these three games combine to form “Showdown Saturday,” one of the most action-packed single-day, early season slate of games the Hudson Valley/Long Island/Connecticut region has seen.
* Previous “You make the call” topic threads
This weekend’s April 3 games promise to be eventful and action-packed, with four of the teams involved — No. 1 West Islip, No. 2 St. Anthony’s, No. 11 Chaminade and No. 18 John Jay — all in Top 25 in the latest Under Armour/Inside Lacrosse National Rankings.
That much is certain.
But who’s going to win?
And why?
Let’s hear your thoughts.
A couple of quick notes:
* The Somers-St. Anthony’s game, which had originally been scheduled for noon on Saturday, has been moved to 2 p.m.
* All proceeds of the John Jay-Yorktown game will once again support the battle against breast cancer. Parents (led by Yorktown team captains’ parents Lisa Lieberman, Robyn Mabus, Lisa Porcelli and Jeanne Interlicchio) will be asking for a donation of any amount at the entrance to Charlie Murphy Field and will be having a 50/50 raffle to raise money for “Support Connection,” which is a Yorktown-based group that assists women with breast and ovarian cancer.
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Posted In: You make the call
in JJ vs. ‘town…. John Jay.
Yorktown lacks another dominating offensive player other than K.I
JJ has a lot more weapons… and have strong defensemen to keep up with K.I around the crease.
Should be a John Jay win, only way this wouldn’t happen is if Mike Daniello tries to do everything for his team and carries too much on offense.
West Islip wins over Chaminade
reason being… Nick Gallaso….
St. Anthony’s over Somers.
Somers has good players on both the defensive and offensive side of the ball… but mis matches at the midfield on defense is their downfall. they will probably be more competitve than expected though
St. A’s will easily beat Somers by 4 or 5
West Islip should squeak by Chaminade 1 or 2 goals
Yorktown will DESTROY John Jay it will not even be close
Joe as I’m sure you know there’s also a big one in Jersey on Saturday with Summit playing Delbarton – two Top 25 nationally ranked teams.
Joe lets not look past Mahopac hosting East Islip should be a contest
On paper should not be a struggle for Jay to beat Town–but that’s “on paper”.
WI over Cham
St. A’s over Somers but will be a competitive match
have to go with the fish in this…although I don’t think Y’town DESTROYS Jay…Jay will get better by year end
St. A’s big
Jay by 2 or 3
WI by 1 (only because they are at home)
freshfish I could not disagree with you more on “Ytown DESTROYS Jay”
…… the game will be very close and Jay’s defense may be the deciding X-factor. Their D is big strong, fast and six deep and if the have a working plan to nulify KI it will be a long afternoon for us Townies Our D will have its hands full with Daniello and Walter.
Hey folks – I have a couple of schedule changes to report.
The Somers at St. Anthony’s game on Saturday will now be at 2 p.m. and not noon.
The scrimmage between Somers, Bronxville, Suffern and White Plains scheduled for Tuesday at 11 a.m. at White Plains has now been moved to Somers on Wednesday at 11:30 a.m. I will send along the schedule for that scrimmage as soon as it is finalized.
Will go with Jay by 2-3 with the assumption J can “control” KI’s scoring. If so, then I see J having the offensive and defensive edge.
WI by 2 over Chaminade 8-6
St A’s by 4 over Somers 11-7 (If St A’s midfield is healthy)
JJ by 1 in OT over Ytown (On paper JJ by more but too early in season for a junior centric team with a new coach) 10-9
IMO
Joe,
As if you aren’t excellently covering enough regions already but where does one go to find out scouting reports, etc about upper NYS teams like WG, Canandaigua, etc? Do they have a blog up there? Thx
Slacrosse –
For the Buffalo (Section 6) region:
http://www.clarencelax.com/Section6Lax/home.htm
For the Rochester (Section 5) region:
http://sportsfive.net
For the Syracuse (Section 3) region:
http://justlacrosse.com
First off, MAN I hate missing Jay-Town game!
Jay over Town (very close): Jay traditionally starts strong, Town tradtitionally finishes strong, but not sure how Schurr impacts that for Jay. I think the loss of Merlino hurts more than folks think, but in the end I think Jay’s D makes the difference. Encourage by Jay not getting blown out by WI in scrimmage, but obviously haven’t seen either team. We may not know the names of who’s going to step up for Town, but someone will, they always do.
WI over Chaminade: Bet against WI at your own peril, especially while Nick G is still there. Until someone knocks the king off, I’m sticking with them. Didn’t sound like Chaminade was strong vs. Pequa.
Somers over St.A’s: Why not? I don’t think anyone gives Somers a chance, but you never know. No harm in being a Section 1 homer, especially since it’s both teams first game.
Doid23
Althouigh picked SA over somers in a close one , agree could go other way. Somers has the horses to do it this season. Agree with someone above who said test could come down to DM’s slowing down Schrieber, etc.
West Islip -13
Chaminade-11
John Jay-8
Town-5
St Anthony’s-15
Somers-4
Not an easy game in the bunch to pick.
Contrary to all the chicken little’s (especially in Katonah), who thought John Jay lax was cooked when the Sav’s rode out of town, I still have this as the team to beat in Section 1, so I pick them to triumph.
Somers in an upset, mostly because there are so many Janavey-haters out there who simply don’t understand what this guy has meant for Westchester/Putnam/Dutchess lacrosse. I never hear his Westrock players complain about him, but I get the feeling there are a lot of guys who never got the invite to play and are a bit ticked off about that. Thus, that haters like to sound off. The guy can flat out coach and he’s got strong group to work with – they’ll be ready.
Chaminade may win it all this year, but how can you go against a game-changer like NG and the venerable WI program? Still, I have to go Chaminade simply on program momentum.
As promised, here is the schedule for the four-way scrimmage that was scheduled for White Plains on Tuesday, but will now be played at Somers on Wednesday:
Turf One ( Scoreboard) Turf Two (Lower)
11:30-12:15- Somers- Bronxville White Plains- Suffern
12:25-1:10 – Suffern- Somers Bronxville- White Plains
1:20-2:05 – Somers- White Plains Suffern- Bronxville
2- 21 Min Halves- Running. 2 Min Halftime- No Timeouts. Both Teams Keep it in at 2 Min
I don’t feel confident enough with all that has happened in the off season to make definitive picks for this Saturday. I have had about all I can take in regards to “on paper” JJ should have no problem beating Yorktown. Are you guys new to Westchester ? Yorktown has consistently, for 20 years now, used new starters to dominate. They may not have as much fire power as last year, but every single one of their players will know exactly what to do come Saturday. They will play this game like it is their last and they have a heck of a lot more than KI wearing green and white. Believe me. They will be very close or equal to Jay in talent. They are also at home.
St. Anthony’s should be able to chip away at Somers for the entire game, winning by 6 goals or so by the end. St. Anthony’s has far superior lacrosse players if athletically Somers has a slight edge. Slight.
I do not know enough about Chaminade but this is going to be a very good year for WI. Galasso has been dominating H.S. for nearly half a decade. Don’t care who you are- they can beat you if they feel like it.
all very close games..
jj by 1 if they contain KI enough
WI by 2
St. A’s by about 3-4
JJ 8, Town 6 – The master of defense will design a scheme to limit KI to no more than 2 goals. Daniello 3 goals, 3 assists as JJ pulls it out and show theyre worthy of #18 national ranking.
St. A’s 12, Somers 6 – Now is the best time for Somers to play St. A’s which always starts slow and finishes strong but let’s be real. Somers staying in the game against the #2 team in the country let alone winning? Ah no. Yes Somers has the athletes but this is still lacrosse and St. A’s also has great lacrosse players.
WI 11, Chaminade 8 – WI is a prideful team and other than WM does not have many true tests on their schedule. They will be up for this one and will pull away for the win.
An important note on the John Jay-Yorktown game.
All proceeds will once again support the battle against breast cancer. Parents (led by Yorktown team captains’ parents Lisa Lieberman, Robyn Mabus, Lisa Porcelli and Jeanne Interlicchio) will be asking for a donation of any amount at the entrance to Charlie Murphy Field and will be having a 50/50 raffle to raise money for “Support Connection,” which is a Yorktown-based group that assists women with breast and ovarian cancer.
I’m not a Somers supporter.
But wow. here comes another person, this time “laxislife82′ calling Somers’s D1 recruits and other players including Petre, Pfiffner, Schurr, Bello, Longo, Deinna, Tullgren JUST athletes and not skilled lacrosse players!! Boy I hope Somers remembers that they are playing a LACROSSE games on Sat vs St. A’s and do not cpme out in football, basketball, or hockey jerseys! Do they have lacrosse sticks?
Somers is loaded with at least as many if not more “lacrosse players” as Jay, Town and other top teams. They happen to be good athletes as well.
Sure odds are that SA will probably beat Somers but it will be because SA’s team may have more and better ‘lacrosse players” then Somers’s fine “lacrosse players”, not because SA’s lacrosse players beat Somers’s “athletes”.
Thanks Slacrosse. Not sure why people think that Somers athletes are not going to established lacrosse programs or established Universities. I really think these JJ fans must have been on the teams that lost to Somers in 2003 and 2006 and cannot handle it. What is it with Indian J. Last year must have put him into therapy for months, maybe still there. Yet Somers players and fans are not out their trashing the JJ players EVER. So I guess the athletes at Somers have more class than the lacrosse fans of JJ.
2006? Even from my therapist’s couch I know that Jay beat Somers 11-2 in 2006. While some of my critique may seem unfair, it’s still an opinion and not meant to start a mud slinging battle. Somers is obviously successful. Maybe you are seeing stick skills that I’m not. I am not the end all judge of section one. Yes, last year put me in therapy but my therapist said that I can watch any game tape from 2004-2008 and of course from 1996-2001 to get on the road back to recovery. 02,03 and 09 are the therapy years. The rest belongs to us my friend.
Actually both jj and Somers won in 2006 jj – A and Somers B. BTW -the 11-2 was regular season and wasn’t that Schurr’s defense?
WI 12, Cham 7
St. A’s 11, Somers 6
John Jay 10, Yorktown 7
Joe
No respect for Pac in podcast.As usual all Yorktown all the time.
Let’s see. Mahopac last beat Yorktown WHEN? Mahopac lost to White Plains last year. Get some grip on reality. It’s a podcast. He didn’t have 5 hours to mention every team in the section – just an overview of the best of the best. If Pac shows they belong there this season then you can talk. They haven’t done that for years. That’s just a fact.
Fan123- Wow, you’re getting in the weeds here. Somers players and fans have NEVER talked trash about JJ? Really? And because of one innocent enough post, not “trashing” Somer’s at all, just stating his perception (one that confuses me as well, but it didn’t sound malicious), now all Somers players are classier than all J fans? Please.
As to 2006, you were wrong. You said that Somers beat J. They didn’t. They lost 11-2. Admit you’re wrong, don’t try to spin it that they both won.
Jaybird, HV Lax
You guys are correct in the fact that Pac has not not been in the win column enough and against the top teams in recent yrs.
But I like the idea of the traditional northern west. power teams playing each other–its “tradition”–and Pac has been part of it with good teams over the yrs.
Seriously, there may come a time when J may have some down yrs with Pac or someone else up there at the top. Bet you’d still want to have the chance to play against them.
Guess I’m saying that someone, even Jay fans, SHOULD have made some comments about not playing them when the schedules were announced..
WI 14 Cham 6
St A 10 Som 5
JJ 7 Yt 6
Jaybird and HV lax
Man talk about obnoxious fans of two teams that everybody respects.Just saying that this years Pac team deserves recognition in Section 1 as they are very talented.Take it easy.Good goalie big time scorer and returning midfield.Just accept the fact that Joe dissed them in the podcast.
I don’t like the term “showdown Saturday” for the first true weekend of HS lacrosse. These are 6 tradition rich teams that will all have great seasons regardless of the outcome of these early season games. I enjoy reading the blogs, and Joe you do a great job with getting out info to the masses, but please leave the hype out, especially this early in the year. Let’s keep in mind no one’s season is finished if they lose a couple of games.
That being said I’m going with West Islip, Yorktown, and St. Anthony’s. lol, sorry
gimme a stick –
If we had said “Final showdown,” you would have a point. But John Jay-Yorktown has been regarded as the game of the year in Section 1 lax for at least five years now.
West Islip is ranked first in the country, Chaminade No. 11.
St. Anthony’s is No. 2 nationally and Somers is coming off a season in which it ended the sectional title run of the 18th-ranked team in the country, John Jay.
These are definitely all major showdowns indeed. What’s especially noteworthy too is that they are all on the same day in the first full week of the season. I’ve never seen anything like this before.
lax123 – I appreciate your passion for the ‘Pac. You should be proud of what is one of the region’s top programs. But there was no “diss” involved, as I think you know. I was giving a brief overview of the entire region, including Long Island and Connecticut as well as the Hudson Valley, and focusing on a few of the teams to watch in each region. It was a broad brush. There was no way to include every team that can be classified as a contender from such a wide area in a podcast platform like that. As you know, we have had plenty of info on the ‘Pac here in the last few weeks leading up to the season, including the perspectives of several players.
Even so, you should always keep in mind that we have a proactive policy here. This is your site as much as it is mine. If you feel something or someone is overlooked or not mentioned, be an advocate. Don’t complain about it. Use that energy and your insights to tell us why. That’s what this blog is all about.
well said Joe, Are we going to hear from Syracuse soon?
Joe, thanks for a fast reply, must be lunchtime lol
I guess my point is there have been matchups for top programs in the early season for decades, and yes they are great games to watch but I just think sometimes things get overhyped in this new age of instant opinions over the internet. I go back aways and I know and early season setback would never ruin a season…there’s so much talk these days you hope the kids don’t read the blogs, I’m not sure how the pro athletes handle it, let alone a high school athlete.
Joe …. What is your personel view of both the Yorktown and John Jay teams, I assume you have seen them once or twice already this year?
gimme a stick –
I see your point, but as the popularity of lacrosse has grown, so has the interest. And that’s good to see. It is still very different than say, football, where one loss in a big game really can ruin a season. As we know, that’s not the case in lax (during the regular season), no matter how anticipated the game. I think most folks, and certainly the players, realize that. And most players I know enjoying playing in and always remember the big games in which there was a lot of build-up and fan interest.
old timer –
I have had a few good conversations with Syracuse the last few weeks. He hopes to get to some games soon. But he’s been very wrapped up with work and his schedule probably will remain pretty crazy until after the NFL Draft, which was not the case last season.
Lax123 you are right about wanting Mahopac on the JJ schedule but having to play Byram Hills and Greeley twice due to new League makes it more difficult. Plus don’t forget you guys have one of the best Sec 1 goalies. Good luck this season.
Town Laxer –
It’s very hard to evaluate teams based on scrimmages. But I would say there will be a few keys to keep an eye on. Both teams have Hopkins-bound offensive stars in Kevin Interlicchio (Yorktown) and Mike Daniello (John Jay). Both teams will make containing each of these guys their No. 1 defensive priority. Whoever is most successful in this area will have a key edge.
As regular readers know, when it comes to any even match-up, I always point to the possession game as being critical. Who will get the most ground balls and win the most faceoffs? Players to keep an eye on in the faceoff X include Forrest Walter (JJ), Joey Porcelli (Yorktown) and Nick Donovan (Yorktown).
I don’t see why Jay is so heavily favored in these forums. Town brings back plenty of offense and a goalie ready to play. I would take Town by 3. Final score 13 – 10 town.
Merlino out has to count for something.
On a side note, what do people think about Mercer Island playing Mahopac and L/P back to back?
Typical LP/Pac. Instead of trying to schedule top teams from Connecticut or Long Island they play these no name programs from the West Coast. That’s why they don’t get the respect bc they don’t play anyone out of the section and lose to the top three programs Ytown/JJ/Somers every year.
Actually Mercer Island (6-0) is a solid west coast team (Usually top 8 in WA state) and the LP coach has a connection there as they went west either last year or the year before. Good athletes, Lax IQ improving as youth programs grow in WA. I think it is good for Lacrosse and not a bad warm up for the season. LP is a good program.
lp coach and mercer island coach played together. they alternate coast to coast trips every year. mercer island went 0-4 last year on their east coast trip. playing the ny talent definitely helpsmercer compete back home.
As for face-offs will be good to see Walters and McCormack (rye) battling each other again this season. Think Walters gave McCormack his toughest day last season (Hittman of LP was tough as well!)
Rye is traveling down to Maryland and will play Dulaney High School tomorrow (scrimmage with another team th) at Johns Hopkins. First Spring trip and should be a thrill for the kids playing at Homewood Field!
Good to see Rye expanding its play (even a scrimmage) outside of Sect 1. The more they play quality out side Sect 1 the better come playoffs. Especially without power league
Joe –
Good tidbits or areas to watch for in games …. would be fun to get your detailed perspective on key matchup or differentiators in a given game. Example …. I did not know Nick Donavan was now taking Faceoffs…. is he using long pole or a shortie?
Just Sayin,
Let me play devil’s advocate….Lets say that a Sec 1 team scheduled a top team from out of conference (ex Ridgefield) and lost by 8. Does the experience of gettting waxed by a much better team (on that day) help? Or would it be better to play a tight game with a quality opponent?
Neither Pac or L/P are looking past Mercer Island. Maybe you should go to both games and provide some feedback tomorrow.
Dulaney High School is gonna be a tough one for Rye. One of the top 2 public perennial powers in MD (severna park the other), huge huge student body, game is at homewood field… garnets will get their learn on i reckon. Good for them. Hopefully NY puts one in the W column.
Cham 9, WI 8 … OT
St. A’s 10, Somers 8
WI 11, Cham 10
JJ 8, Ytown 6
Yorktown vs. JJ – Im gonna go with Ytown pulling it out by 2… K. Interlicchio will put on a show on Charlie Murphy field and lead his team to a 2-0 start.
WI vs Cham – WI rebounds, 10-6
St. A’s vs Somers – BIG LOU!!! He may come up short against a VERY talented St. A’s team… 11-6
Dulaney is down this year…I don’t know if that means Rye is going to win, but Dulaney isn’t one of the top five public schools this year in Maryland.
just sayin –
i think its time LP gets some respect in section one. last year taking down both somers and jj and just blowing a 5 goal lead to ytown, their third section final in the past 3 years. look for them this year with honovich, prunty, and a solid returning defense.
other than that….
jj by 3, i think defensive minded timmy schurr will find a way to silence KI
WI over cham by a few, for two reasons..nicky..and galasso. the kids probably the best in the country, scores at will almost.
somers over SA by a goal…their talented tough kids and i think theyll want the win more, and we all know heart has a lot to do with the outcome.