Balanced attack leads Timberlane boys lacrosse to win over Merrimack

MERRIMACK - The Timberlane Regional High School boys lacrosse team has been trying to find someone to step up on offense when opponents try to take away Matt Licata.

During that process, the Owls may have found more than just someone.

With Merrimack focused on taking Licata out of the game in the first half, Timberlane had other players step up and score before the Owls' sophomore found the back of the net himself in the second half on the way to a 12-5 win on Monday.

Licata finished four goals and two assists to lead Timberlane (3-1) while Jack Gray scored all three of his goals in the first quarter, helping the Owls take a 5-1 lead in opening 12 minutes. Vaughn Bourassa added two goals and an assist while Cody Fleming, Jake Diburro and Chris Longhcamp had a goal apiece.

"We have some pretty athletic guys," Timberlane coach Ken Blaszka said of his attack. "We want to drive from the open man, not just one guy, and that helps. It hurts you if you can’t do that and you get one dimensional."

Maxwell Szczapa added two assist and Nate Taylor led the defense with eight saves, as the Owls withstood a long Merrimack (1-4) possession to open the second quarter, allowing just one goal. Timberlane led 6-2 at halftime and scored twice in the first two minutes of the third to take control of the game.

"We put those in right away," Blaszka said. "We have a couple of things we do to push transition. We talked about halftime that we wanted to push it, use our athletes to be athletes, and get them out of position."

Merrimack got two goals from Jordan Petrocelli while Jay Lanigan and T.J. Fasano and Garrett Murray made eight saves.

"Right now, we’re playing very slow," Merrimack coach Brian Miller said. "We were not ready to play and I guess that’s on us as a coaching staff. We were very slow to respond in several different situations, whether it be taking care of things at the midfield, or defensive adjustments. I don’t know if that’s April break, or coaching, or this or that. It took us a while to wake up and get going."

Timberlane jumped on the board 1:09 into the game on Fleming's goal but Fasano answered for Merrimack 43 seconds later to tie the game up. The Owls won the ensuing faceoff, raced down the field and found Gray for his first goal of the game 25 seconds later.

After a penalty put Timberlane a man down, Gray scored off a Merrimack turnover just 57 seconds later to make it 3-1, and three minutes after that, the junior added another to push the lead to 4-1.

"They were dialed in and it really helped, especially right off the bat, getting three goals from Jack Gray," Blaszka said. "Right off the bat, we’re showing that if you’re going to worry about one of our guys, someone else is going to step up."

The Owls' lead was 5-1 going into the second when Merrimack looked like it was going to close the gap. The Tomahawks scored 1:33 into the quarter to make it 5-2 and Julien Hoven won the faceoff to give Merrimack possession.

But despite having the ball for most of the first half of the second quarter, the Tomahawks couldn't capitalize. Merrimack's best chance came on a point-blank shot, but Taylor came up with the save to keep it 5-2.

Bourassa scored with 3:32 left in the half to make it a four-goal game at the break, and Licata recorded his first goal 37 seconds into the third and Longchamp scooped up a groundball near midfield and scored in transition 1:16 later to make it 8-2. Licata scored three more times in the quarter to help give Timberlane a 12-4 lead at the end of the third.

"We had matchup issues with him in the second half and he made us pay," Miller said. "He’s a good player and he made us pay. He’s probably one of the better attackmen that we’ve faced."