Nearly one month ago, the boys lacrosse teams of Western Albemarle and Monticello played an intense game with a lopsided score. On Tuesday night at Monticello, the Warriors and Mustangs ran it back in a rematch.
There was a similar outcome in this installment.
Despite the scoreboard showing another lopsided score in favor of Western for most of the game, the two teams played with a high level of intensity and physicality from start to finish, and the Warriors left with a 19-4 victory.
Western head coach Mario Washington anticipated that both teams would come in with a lot of energy and prepared his team to play with level heads.
“We practice this all the time at a high level with the speed and intensity,” Washington said. “What I told them was to play smart and play with a purpose. Win the ground ball battle and everything will shake out after that. And they did that tonight.”
Western played well on both ends of the field, especially in the first half. The Warriors scored the game’s first eight goals and did not give up a single goal to Monticello until nearly halfway through the second quarter.
Freshman Quinn Reilly got the scoring started by picking up a loose rebound and scoring on a quick putback a little more than four minutes in to give Western the lead. Reilly led the Warriors with five goals and was one of four Western players to score at least three goals in the game.
“He’s the motor,” Washington said of Reilly. “He’s one of those young guys, a freshman that knows where he should be on the field.”
Both teams were whistled for several penalties in the game, but had little success converting on man-up opportunities. Monticello had two man-up chances in the first half, but gave up goals to Western’s Gray Kallen and Tyler Spano in transition during both of those man-ups. Kallen finished with two goals and Spano, who also dominated at the faceoff, recorded a hat trick.
“We really just brought the energy tonight,” Reilly said. “We have been working really hard in practice.”
Monticello finally got on the board with a man-up goal in the second quarter from long-stick midfielder Cooper Hauser. Hauser scored two of the four goals for the Mustangs, who struggled all night to get into a rhythm offensively.
Quinn Reilly scored his second goal in transition to make it 10-1, before Monticello scored two straight goals to end the half with the score 10-3. Reilly scored on a roll dodge to start the second half and begin a 4-0 Warriors run to extend the lead to 14-3.
“When guys are dodging, he’s always finding the open window,” Washington said of Reilly’s performance. “He’s great at finishing inside. He is a fantastic young man who is very hungry to always learn.”
In the fourth quarter, tensions seemed to dissipate after a particularly chippy third quarter. Both teams continued to play hard but there was no extracurricular activity. Western outscored Monticello 5-0 in the final quarter, including two more goals from Quinn Reilly and one apiece from Stuart Widener and William Ferguson, who each finished with four goals.
“We knew going in that these guys would be fired up and we just had to match their energy,” Reilly said after the game. “We did a great job with that.”
Up next, Western will play at Fluvanna on Tuesday, while Monticello will play at Albemarle on Friday night.
