Different venue but the story looked the same: The CVU boys lacrosse team was less than a minute away from falling to Essex for the second straight year and the fourth time in five years in the Division I championship game.
This year would be different.
Lawrence Dee scored a game tying goal with 40 seconds left which sent the title game to overtime. Jeff Palmer was able to score 2:08 into the overtime which gave the Redhawks their first boys lacrosse championship since 2006.
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | OT | Final | |
| (2) Essex | 1 | 0 | 4 | 2 | 0 | 7 |
| (1) CVU | 2 | 2 | 0 | 3 | 1 | 8 |
“Words can’t describe my love for this team,” said Dee. “We never doubted ourselves for a second that we were going to lose this game.”
Justin Beaudry scored twice and assisted on Dee’s goal for CVU (18-1). Jake Marston and Nathaniel Wells also scored twice for the depleted Redhawks. The team was without four players for their final two games while Robbie Dobrowski was ejected in CVU’s win over Woodstock which meant he couldn’t play in the final.
“Our motto here is everyone needs to be ready to start—and they were,” said Dee. “The younger guys stepped up. Ever since the loss to Essex, we knew we had to play as a team to win this.”
CVU beat Essex in their first meeting of the season but Essex topped CVU the second time around, ending the Redhawks’ 13-0 start to the season.
“Essex has one of the most solid defenses in the state and since we lost to them earlier in the season we knew we wanted to redo our offense,” said Dee. “The past week in practice we really emphasized slowing the ball down and working our offense rather than pushing on transition and playing run-and-gun.”
The emphasis on slowing the offense paid off early as CVU jumped out to a 4-1 lead at halftime. The game tightened up as Essex dominated the third quarter, outscoring CVU 4-0 including three unassisted goals.
The fourth quarter was back and forth but Essex (16-3) appeared to be in control after taking a 7-6 lead thanks to Michael Maloney’s goal. The Hornets held that lead until giving up the goal to Dee which sent the game to sudden death overtime.
Essex’s Martin Harrison scored a hat trick in the loss, including two unassisted goals in the third quarter. James Olsen finished with a goal and an assist for the Hornets.
Eric Palmer finished with ten saves for CVU. Essex goalie Pat Abbott stopped eleven shots.
Congrats. to the CVU redhawks they played a great game against a excellent Essex team. They showed a lot of heart after losing several of there key players earlier in the week.They showed they are vermonts best high school lacrosse team this year.Well done redhawks.
Wait til next season