Pinkerton boys lacrosse picks up sloppy win over Exeter (video)

DERRY - Getting a win was the most important thing Thursday night for the Pinkerton Academy boys lacrosse team.

But in the final week of the regular season, there are certain things a coach likes to see.

And while Brian O'Reilly saw a lot of those things from the Astros in a 13-7 win over Exeter in a Division I games, there were plenty of other things that will need to be cleaned up before the start of the postseason next week.

"I thought we played well and then we got very sloppy with the ball in the fourth quarter," O'Reilly said. "I didn’t like what we did. We threw passes up for grabs, didn’t get ground balls and just made dumb mistakes. We were playing so well."

It was a 2-2 game late in the first quarter, when Pinkerton (13-4, No. 2 in the NHHSS Coaches Poll) got goals from Ryan Auger and Mason Drouin 54 seconds apart to take a two-goal lead. That started a 5-0 run to end the first half and the Astros went on another 5-0 run in a span of 2:57 in the third quarter to take a commanding 12-3 lead.

But the Astros scored just once over the game's final 15 minutes, as Exeter was able to find a little bit of life in the fourth quarter.

"The only thing that matters is the W and I’ll take it, even a one-goal win," O'Reilly said, "but the truth of the matter is that we had them at halftime and we should have finished them off and we didn’t."

Drouin led Pinkerton with four goals and three assists while Auger had three goals and three assists. Hunter Drouin also scored three times and had a helper and Owen McCormack (two assists), Connor McCormack and Riley Spellman had a goal apiece. Jack Sweeney made six saves in goal and Patrick Last also had an assist.

Exeter (12-5, No. 3) got three goals and an assist from Spencer Clark while Wyatt Carr added two goals and Dayton Christenson and Connor Holly had a goal apiece. Henry Vogt made 10 saves before leaving in the third quarter with what appeared to be an injury to his lower right leg and Solomon Hearing made three saves in relief.

"At times, I thought we played hard and played with some composure," Exeter coach Gerry Holly said. "We’ve got to be smarter, we’ve got to be able to recognize different situations and be able to play within in ourselves. I think we tried to run a little too much (Thursday) and they’re a lot faster than us.

"We definitely had some depth issues and it can catch up to us if we don’t slow it down when we need to against them. We just don’t want to be in a track meet with them."

Pinkerton opened the game with two goals in the first 90 seconds but Clark got Exeter on the board with 6:20 left in the first quarter to make it 2-1. The Astros were called for a pair of penalties moments later and the Blue Hawks capitalized on the two-man advantage, as Connor Holly made it 2-2 with 3:47 left in the frame.

But 19 seconds after the goal, Exeter's Connor Flanagan picked up two penalties and Auger scored during the manup to put Pinkerton back in front with 2:21 remaining in the first. The Blue Hawks won the faceoff, but couldn't hang on to possession and Mason Drouin made it 4-2 with 1:27 to play in the quarter.

After Pinkerton went up 7-2 at halftime, Exeter got within four on a goal by Clark with 8:47 remaining in the third, and the Blue Hawks had a chance for more as Owen McCormack was called for a slash before the goal.

But the Astros killed off the penalty and then scored on a manup opportunity of their own, as Hunter Drouin found the back of the net to make 8-3 with 5:57 left in the third to start Pinkerton on another 5-0 run.

"That’s what it’s supposed to be," O'Reilly said. "But then we started forcing the ball inside and making lazy passes. It was one thing after another. We lost the flow of it. We were still in control, but it was just sloppy. You don’t want to do that with good teams."

The win puts Pinkerton in line for the No. 2 seed if the Astros beat Andover (Mass.) on the road Friday at 7 p.m. Exeter finishes out the regular Friday at 4 p.m. at Nashua North.