Adjustment key in Bishop Guertin boys lacrosse win over Exeter

There have been several different ways teams have tried to slow down Brian Cameron throughout this boys lacrosse season.

Some teams were successful, to a degree, against the Bishop Guertin High School junior, while others were not.

But not many did what No. 6 Exeter did Wednesday when it played the No. 2 Cardinals in the Division I semifinals.

Whenever someone else got the ball on offense for Bishop Guertin, an Exeter player - usually junior Anders Dachsteiner - found Cameron and face-guarded him.

At times that made for an unusual setup, with Cameron standing behind the cage, as far back as the end line, with Dachsteiner's back to the play, and the teams playing five-on-five. But when Cameron got the ball, a long pole came to relieve Dachsteiner and shortly thereafter, another long pole would join for a double team.

"They went to a straight shut off on Brian, and not only that, they doubled, so we took a timeout just to adjust a little bit," Bishop Guertin coach Chris Cameron said. "We've seen a lot of different defenses, but that one took us a timeout to adjust. Brian had to give himself up and we left it for the other guys to play five-on-four. Once we did that, it opened things up."

In terms of limiting how many times Brian Cameron found the back of the net, Exeter's plan worked, as his lone goal came on a behind-the-back shot with goalie Henry Vogt out of position.

But Cameron also finished with four assists, and by dragging defenders away from the play, it allowed Drew Hailey, John Bruno and Sean Cameron to find open lanes.

"We've been talking about balanced scoring," Chris Cameron said. "We had the balance there. I give (Exeter) credit. Either way, it's pick your poison the way we are playing offensively. We're scoring right now, but we have to get better defensively."

The Blue Hawks stayed with the Cardinals in the first half thanks largely to the offense of Mike Penna, who scored Exeter's first two goals and helped them tie it 3-3 at the end of one quarter. Bishop Guertin broke away early in the second to go up 7-3, but the lead was 8-5 at halftime.

"Their five goals (in the first half), they only had maybe nine possessions, so that wasn't a good job by us," Cameron said. "We needed to get back to playing the defense that we're capable of and that's what we did.

"We played better team defense, we mixed it up a little bit on Penna. It was a bad matchup for us because we have a 6-foot-6 guy (Doug Barker) on a 5-foot-7 guy. It's hard to get down that low, so we made an adjustment."

What that means for Saturday's championship game against Pinkerton, which is scheduled for 7:30 p.m. in Exeter, remains to be seen, as the Cardinals had one of their worst offensive games in years in a 7-5 loss during the regular season. The output by Bishop Guertin was its lowest since scoring five in a loss to Lincoln-Sudbury (Mass.) in 2013.

"We have to play better to beat a team a team like Pinkerton in the championship," Cameron said. "One thing we preached all year was stay out of the penalty box and that's the most penalties we've had all year. Our clearing was pretty poor."

The final will be the fifth straight time the teams have played for the championship, and the ninth time since 2005.