The St. Michael-Albertville boys’ lacrosse team was in a groove headed into the section final against Moorhead. After dispatching Big Lake/Princeton during the Section 8 quarterfinals, the Knights handled Monticello 16-7 in the semifinals. The reward for their efforts was a road trip to Moorhead High School on June 6.
STMA hosted Monticello two days earlier on June 4. The first few minutes belonged to the Magic but the Knights recovered nicely.
An errant pass on the defensive side of the field resulted in an own goal for STMA and they fell behind 1-0 with eight minutes left in the first quarter. A minute and a half later, Monticello’s Gunnar Simon intercepted a pass, raced down the field and doubled the Monticello lead. A minute later, another STMA turnover turned into another Magic goal and the Knights were down 3-0 with 5:25 left in the first.
The Knights woke up after that and closed the game on a 16-4 run. Caleb Waller scored twice within a minute and then dished a wicked assist with 1.1 seconds left in the opening frame that tied the game 3-3.
That run continued as STMA scored five more unanswered goals to take an 8-3 lead and that was all she wrote. They went on to win 16-7 and advanced to the Section 8 Championship.
That set up a familiar matchup in the section final. St. Michael-Albertville and Moorhead have met in the section finals every year since 2022. They also met in the semifinals in 2021. The Knights were looking for some revenge, as the Spuds had knocked them out in every one of those matchups.
Unfortunately for STMA, the Spuds won the section title and advanced to the state tournament once again. Moorhead took a 4-2 lead into the second and led 8-5 going into the fourth. The Knights had one last gasp in them. They outscored the Spuds 4-1 in the fourth and forced overtime.
Moorhead scored in sudden-death overtime and eliminated STMA from the postseason. Stats were not available for the Monticello or Moorhead games.
The Knights ended the season with an 11-5 record.
Local News
Comments / 0