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06/11/2017 12:00 AMThe Hand boys’ lacrosse squad had a shaky finish to its regular season and took an early exit in the SCC Tournament, but just like in their two previous playoff appearances, the Tigers were on solid footing during the Class M State Tournament on their way to another berth in the championship game.
The Tigers finished the regular season at 10-6 after dropping three of their last five contests before losing to Xavier in the first round of SCCs. However, when the lights went on for Class M State Tournament, 11th-seeded Hand played some of its best lacrosse of the year by dispatching No. 22 seed Newington, No. 6 Berlin, No. 3 Weston, and No. 2 North Haven to reach its third straight Class M final. Then in the championship game at McMahon High School in Norwalk on June 10, the Tigers faced off against a familiar foe in No. 4 seed New Canaan, which had bested Hand in the 2015 and 2016 state finals. The third installment was closer than the first two, but New Canaan still came out on top, this time by a 9-6 final. Hand trailed by one goal at halftime, was only down two entering the final quarter, and then tied the game in the final frame, but the Rams scored the last three goals to come away with the win.
“We went back and forth with them the entire game, up until the last minute of two, and no one player on either end dominated the other,” said Hand Head Coach Paul Deon, who collected his 100th career win this season. “Every single one of our guys was exceptional. Our face-off guy [junior Mark Hartmann, who won 13 of 18 face-offs on the day] was phenomenal.”
The final shots-on-goal tally was close, with New Canaan winning by a 20-15 margin. Sophomore goalie Griffin Fitzmaurice made 11 saves for the Tigers on the afternoon. Senior Liam Gottlick and junior Nate Palumbo both scored two goals, while sophomore Tom Swank and senior Tanner Garitta had one goal apiece, with Swank also handing out an assist. Hand, which finished with a record of 14-8, corralled 23 ground balls in the game, while New Canaan (15-4) had 18.
“We’ve had good, senior leadership on defense. Tanner Garitta is three-year starter, and John Jibilian is a four-year one. They played a phenomenal game, and those guys are our rocks on defense,” said Coach Deon of his defensive core, which allowed only 10 goals in its first four games of states. “We use different slide packages, and we show several different sets, which has made us unpredictable this year. We know how to execute on defense and also what the other team is trying to do. We do scouting and see where teams will go with the ball.”
New Canaan struck first when Ryan O’Connell scored with 3:58 remaining in the opening quarter, and then Quintin O’Connell made it 2-0 with 2:17 to play in the period. Hand soon found its way onto the scoreboard to tie things up at 2 heading to the second quarter. First, Swank scored off of an assist from senior Teg Cosgriff with 1:47 remaining when the Tigers were on a man-advantage. After that, Palumbo netted the equalizer with 43 seconds left in the frame.
“They jumped out to that 2-0 lead, and they were both hard-earned goals,” said Coach Deon. “We had some good looks on offense and then tied it up before they got two goals after the illegal stick call.”
New Canaan again went up by two early in the second behind a pair of goals from Ryan O’Connell with 11:27 and 9:30 remaining, respectively, scoring both goals while the Tigers were down a man due to the illegal stick call. Palumbo split the difference with a strike with 4:11 left before halftime, making the score 4-3 Rams at intermission.
At the 8:10 mark of the third quarter, Richard Magnus netted a goal to put the Rams back up by two. New Canaan increased its lead to three when Magnus scored just 12 seconds before the quarter ended. With one second left, Swank fed Garitta for a score that cut it to 6-4 entering the final frame.
Gottlick got Hand within after scoring on a helper from Swank with 10:30 to play in the game. Gottlick then tied the score at 6-6 on Palumbo’s assist with 8:04 remaining. Unfortunately for the Tigers, that was their last score of the day as New Canaan notched three straight goals from Graham Braden (with 6:39 left), Jack Hoelzer (3:28), and Appelt (2:28) on its way to the 9-6 victory.
“When it was 6-3, we stuck to our game-plan, kept battling, and got it to 6-6,” Deon said. “After that, we got some more good looks, including one that hit the pipe. We kept fighting, and then with that last goal, they were exhausted at that point.”
While the Tigers were disappointed that they didn’t come away with a title, Coach Deon feels exceptionally proud of their body of work this spring. It’s no easy task to make three consecutive state finals, especially when you’re filling in numerous holes left by graduation.
“We were losing a lot of players and replacing a lot of them entering the season. We returned only three starters from last year. It’s a tall order to make it to the state final, and we also had some young guys in new positions, so it was great for us to come together as we did,” said Deon. “Making it to three straight state finals is not easy, especially in Class M, because there’s a lot of talent in Connecticut lacrosse. We peaked towards the end of the year and got better and better as the year went on.”
Hand had reached the Class M final by earning a 7-4 win over North Haven in a semifinal contest at West Haven High School on June 7. Gottlick scored three goals for Tigers, who received one score each from junior John Ruggerio, senior Jack Santoro, Gottlick, and Palumbo. Fitzmaurice made eight saves to send the Tigers back to the championship game.
From the Sidelines
Hand’s varsity roster features seniors Teg Cosgriff, Zakery Santoemma, Jack Santoro, Ryan Niles, John Jibilian, Liam Gottlick, Joe Cuticelli, Tanner Garitta, Christian Westphal, Shane Kelly; juniors Flynn Driscoll, Mark Hartmann, John Ruggiero, Nate Palumbo, Charles Jensen, Ryan Coady, Kevin Hughes, Scott Roberts, Mason Feiner, Van Docker; sophomores Matt Rubino, Tom Ferrick, TJ McNeil, Griffin Fitzmaurice, Clay Hayden, Ryan Flynn, Ian Rice, Nick Serio, Tom Swank, Brian Flanagan, Ryley Brohel, Sam Franz, Jack Flanagan, John Genther; freshmen Ben Corniello and Luke Conway.
Hand finished 10-6 on the regular season. The Tigers defeated Conard (4-3), Foran (18-3), Amity (4-3), Simsbury (7-5), Mattituck, New York (13-4); Hamden (16-2), Barlow (12-4), Guilford (10-7), Notre Dame-West Haven (7-5), and Norwich Free Academy (16-2) during the campaign.
Following a 9-5 loss to Xavier in the first round of the SCC Tournament, Hand bet No. 22 seed Newington (17-1), No. 6 Berlin (12-2), and No. 3 Weston (4-3) before facing North Haven and New Canaan.
This marked Hand’s fourth appearance in the Class M final. In its previous appearances, the Tigers lost to New Canaan in 2016 (13-2) and 2015 (10-5) and took a 13-5 defeat to Darien in 2006.