Sports
Huntington Beach Gets Defensive in Lacrosse Win over Newport Harbor
The fourth-ranked Oilers remained undefeated by shutting out the 10th-ranked Sailors in the first half and scoring just enough for a 6-3 victory in Sunset League play.
Huntington Beach may be the best-kept secret in Orange County boys lacrosse, but the way the Oilers have played during the first month of the season, they won’t be for long.
The Oilers showed their defensive strength by shutting out a good Newport Harbor team for more than 27 minutes,and offensively received goals from four different players en route to a 6-3 victory Wednesday night in a Sunset League showdown at Davidson Field in Newport Beach.
Huntington Beach (8-0) moved up in the Orange County U.S. Lacrosse rankings to fourth from fifth this week, trailing only Foothill, El Toro and St. Margaret’s.
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“We’ve been off in our own little corner without playing a lot of teams in this area,” Oilers second-year coach Brian Dunn said. “Our defense is very, very strong. We have a lot of juniors on defense and our goalie [Trevor Jackson] is only a sophomore, but we have [averaged] four or five goals against. But, typically, we're more high-powered on offense. Newport did a good job against us defensively tonight.”
Newport Harbor (3-5), which held its ranking at No. 10 this week, gave the Oilers all they could handle in the fourth quarter, scoring twice within 14 seconds on goals by Park Eddy and Logan Health to cut the deficit to 4-3 with 9:42 remaining.
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But Huntington Beach came back with unassisted goals by Tim Francis, on a sidearm shot from 20 yards, and Steven Koressel, his second of the game, with 50 seconds left to ice the contest.
Jackson finished with nine saves and Zac Vayda of Newport Harbor had 10 as the Sailors outshot the Oilers, 26-25.
“Our record is not indicative of how we’re playing. We’re getting better every game,” said Sailors coach Mark Todd, who was without three starters, including leading scorer Riley Robinson. “We had about 40 turnovers [in the game]. When you give a team the ball back that many times, you’re digging you own grave.”
Huntington Beach led at halftime, 3-0, on first-quarter goals by Geoffrey Lunsk and Jace Gan and a second-quarter goal by Koressel. Lunsk also scored the only goal in the third quarter on Gan’s second assist of the game.
With two losses in league play, Newport Harbor will likely need a victory in its next two games to stay in playoff contention. On Saturday, the Sailors will play at Los Alamitos (1 p.m.) and then travel to Huntington Beach for a rematch against the Oilers on Wednesday.
But for unbeaten Huntington Beach, the playoffs may already be in sight.
