No.1 Saints blast past No.2 Bulldogs

Last season, St. Anne’s-Belfield’s Andrew Crockett was playing lacrosse for a club team in Richmond.
Apparently he’s making the adjustment to the upper echelon of Virginia private school lacrosse quickly. Of course, it doesn’t hurt when Virginia-bound junior Owen Van Arsdale is feeding you the ball.
“He makes me look so much better than I actually am,” Crockett said. “He really does.”
Crockett poured in six goals as St. Anne’s, ranked No. 1 in the state, rolled past No. 2 Norfolk Academy with a 12-6 victory. The rivalry game could easily end up being a preview of this year’s state championship game — the two teams are again ranked in the top two spots, just as they were last spring when St. Anne’s beat the Bulldogs in double overtime to win the state title.
Crockett’s assault came largely in the third quarter when the sophomore poured in five of his six during the frame, finishing off assists from Van Arsdale, Chapin Spiedel, Tim Werner and Charles Schrek during the frame.
“Andrew’s come to us from a level of lacrosse where he hasn’t experienced the quality of competition and yet he’s fed off this level of lacrosse,” said St. Anne’s coach Doug Tarring. “The one thing about Andrew is that our kids realize if they can get him the ball in shooting space, he can finish.”
Crockett also buried a shot off a Logan Pehanick pass during the first quarter. His explosion in the second half only slightly overshadowed Michael Morris’ brilliant second quarter hat trick. Morris helped give St. Anne’s a lot of breathing room going into the half with two of his three goals coming in the final three minutes of the second quarter.
Van Arsdale dished out three assists for St. Anne’s, while Spiedel had a goal and a pair of assists.
St. Anne’s generated a lot of those goals off groundballs and faceoffs, where the Saints offset one of Norfolk’s strengths, dominant face-off man Carter Moore, with a pair of solid face-off specialists of their own, senior Scott Wiseman and freshman Charles Sipe.
“[They] did a great job of even giving us 50-50 opportunities,” Tarring said. “When you run two against one, I think that helped because he got tired. It’s nice to have two face-off guys and as we get on in the season, you can’t face off the same person over and over again.”
St. Anne’s held a 54-40 advantage in groundballs during the contest. That advantage was due in part to the Saints grabbing an early lead and then leaning on their depth for the rest of the contest.
STAB’s defense helped control Norfolk Academy’s potent attack, holding the Bulldogs to just a pair of early goals by agile attcker Schuyler Beecroft in the first half, and just a single tally in the third quarter. Norfolk’s tall, athletic attackmen Andy Via and Eric Gorsline were limited to three goals between them.
Junior goalie Austin Geisler had a number of terrific stops, coming up with several critical saves from point-blank range.
St. Anne’s will next head to Woodberry Friday in another matchup with a tough VISSA Division I squad.