The Trinity Cup will stay with Southlake after the high school boys lacrosse team defeated Keller 17-12. With the team out of the playoff picture following their 6-5 loss to Coppell, the team, and Coach Bart Sullivan, made the night about retaining the Cup and honoring their eight graduating seniors as the Dragons lead from start to finish.
The Dragons, who end with a 3-6 District record and 5-7 overall, did not get the help they needed to earn the final District playoff spot via tiebreaker.
Following the Senior recognition ceremony at halftime of the D2 game, the Dragons came out loose and fast. Junior midfielder Jeremy Bach scored just a minute and a half into the game, followed by two Casey Wasserman goals. Wasserman, a Senior, moved into an attack position after playing most of the season at midfield. Sophomore midfielder Harry Blake also tallied a goal before Keller finally got on the scoreboard.
Senior midfielder AJ Van den Dyssel, utilizing a Preston Deno screen, added his first score on a wrap-around, and he later fed Wasserman for his third goal. The pair showed a chemistry developed by playing together in the Southlake program for nine years. Wasserman added another to stake the Dragons to a 7-1 first quarter lead.
The 2nd quarter started as Senior Attackman Jake Gillen scored his first goal off a Luke Leffingwell feed, and then came right back down the field to score his second goal unassisted. Van den Dyssel followed with a coast-to-coast goal to extend the Dragon lead to 10-1.
The defense, lead by Seniors George Elmquist and Nick Donfris, in front of junior goalie Greg Hill, combined with Junior Ryan Thompson and with sophomores Mitchell Gruenewald and Matt Broadway and later Freddie Elmquist, made it difficult for Keller to build any momentum and successfully thwarted multiple possessions. Senior Defender Michael Tsay and Senior midfielder Carson Green , were honored as part of the recognition ceremony but were unavailable to play in the game.
Junior midfield Austin Lehrman, scored off a feed from sophomore attackman Ben Kehoe, and then faceoff man Luke Leffingwell added a goal, staking the Dragons to a comfortable 12-3 halftime lead.
Bach again scored to start the half before Keller answered with a several goals. So when Blake followed with another goal it was still 14-6. Sullivan let his players have some fun and mixed up positions. While some of his long-time midfield teammates traded their short sticks to grab long poles and join Elmquist on defense, Donfris moved up to attack. Using a give-and-go from Gillen, Donfris got free and tallied a goal to get it to 15-8 to end the 3rd.
The last quarter started off with a nice save of a point-blank shot by Senior goalie Eryk Ross. Blake followed with another goal. Keller would battle back to score a few of their own to get it 16-11. The final Dragon goal was another long feed from Van den Dyssel to Wassermant hat gave the Dragons 17-11 with 5:57 left.
Keller would take advantage of a Dragon penalty and would score with their man advantage, to close to 17-12. Fittingly, the final Keller offensive push was stopped by George Elmquist, who created a turnover with under two minutes remaining. The Dragons cleared to the offensive zone and were able to run out the clock and claim the 17-12 victory and maintaining possession of the Trinity Cup.