Phillylacrosse.com, Posted 4/6/10
Jake O’Brien scored the game winner with 3:13 left in the second overtime, lifting St. Joseph’s Prep past Episcopal Academy, 5-4, tonight in a thrilling non-league boys’ lacrosse game at St. Joseph’s University.
The win gave St. Joe’s Prep coach Eric Gregg a victory over his alma mater and long-time friend, EA coach Andy Hayes. The event also was a special night for Gregg, who as co-founder of the L.E.A.P.S. program, made the evening into a L.E.A.P.S. fundraiser game.
Fans were encouraged to donate equipment and participate in a raffle to benefit the L.E.A.P.S. program, which was created over a year ago by Gregg and fellow Philly pro player John Christmas to build lacrosse programs in the inner city and under-served area of the region. T-shirts were sold, a bake sale was held and L.E.A.P.S. youth players attended the game.
Episcopal Academy, which came in at 6-0 and ranked seventh in the state in the PA Media Lacrosse Rankings, held a 4-1 lead in the third period when the Hawks (4-2) suddenly took over.
“We knew coming off our loss to (arch-rival) La Salle (10-6) Saturday that we were not in shape,” Gregg said. “We ran a lot of conditioning drills to get ready for this and we knew we had to be in better shape, especially late in games.
“Of course, I didn’t figure we’d have to go two overtimes. But our guys are well-coached and they executed the game plan very well.”
Also scoring for the Prep were Cory Scheuerle, Jeff Heath, John Gregitis and Jim O’Rourke. Goalie Mke Zikoski had several key groundballs late in the game and also cleared well.
“It’s a great venue here at St. Joe’s and the crowd was great,” aid Gregg. “The whole idea is to raise awareness for L.E.A.P.S. and the teams in the city. We hope to have eight full teams this year (playing in the Public League).”
Gregg’s old pal, Hayes, had only praise for the Hawks.
“We were up, 4-1, n the third period and then they hammered us in the fourth,” Hayes said. “They completely outplayed us . We had a bunch of opportunities and did not finish.
“Kudos to the Prep. They played a really good game.”
Morgan Westy, Tyler Olsen, Connor Haab and Gerry Smith each scored for EA.
Episcopal Acad. 2-1-1-0-0-0 4
StJP 1-0-1-2-0-1 5
