Santa Barbara High boys lacrosse battled their way to an 8-5 crosstown rivalry win over Dos Pueblos on Tuesday at Peabody Stadium.
The Dons (5-0, 1-0 Channel League) are off to one of their best starts in recent history, and began their Channel League season with a crucial win over the defending league champion Chargers (3-3, 1-1 CL).
“The last three years, [DP kind of put the smack down on us,” Santa Barbara High head coach John Keogh said. “We knew they graduated a lot of guys, but that doesn’t automatically mean we’re going to win. They’re really well coached. They played a really aggressive zone defense.
“We’re just going one game at a time. We don’t know what this feeling is like, being 5-0… We just kind of don’t want to screw it up… The idea is just to come to work every day and put in the hard work, and just try to win every game you play.”
While Dos Pueblos has dominated the league in recent years, the Chargers and Dons seem poised to clash as the two top squads for years to come as they both field strong and youthful rosters.
“[SB] is a really strong team. They have a lot of talent, a lot of young talent,” Dos Pueblos head coach Lucas Martinez said. “I was really impressed with what Santa Barbara did. They played a really aggressive game.
“I think everyone who pays attention to lacrosse in Santa Barbara knew that it was going to be DP and Santa Barbara, and we have a lot of things going for both of our teams… I think it’s great for lacrosse in Santa Barbara to have a rivalry, to have teams that are competing like we just competed in this game.”
The majority of the opening quarter was a defensive battle, as both sides stood tall and consistently turned the opposing offense away without a shot on goal.
The Dons finally broke through with 3:06 left in the quarter when Connor Jackson fired a shot through the Dos Pueblos defense and into the back of the net for the 1-0 lead, which held into the second.
Santa Barbara High found a bit of its offensive groove early in the second quarter, scoring on back-to-back possessions to expand its lead to 3-0.
The first goal came on a transition breakaway when Caden Chessmar found Flynn Chenoweth for the score, while the second was courtesy of an impressive outside shot by Vonn Forrest at the 9:57 mark of the second.
A few minutes later, that lead grew to 4-0 when Chenoweth wrapped around from behind the net and snuck his shot past the goalie.
Dos Pueblos got on the board with 3:37 to go in the first half when Koa Birchim dished out a pass to Austin Fauver, who finished it off for the goal. However, the Dons scored just 10 seconds later as Chenoweth completed his second-quarter hat trick with a goal off an assist from Parker Mercado to make it 5-1.
“At the end of the day, we made too many mistakes. We were making self-inflicted wounds,” Martinez said of his offensive struggles. “We were turning the ball over on uncontested passes. Just playing a little bit out of our heads.
“We’re not going to beat anyone by turning the ball over as much as we turned the ball over today. At the end of the day, that’s what the offense came down to.”
Dos Pueblos rounded out the first-half scoring on a transition goal by Koa Birchim on an assist by Rohan Wansor, bringing the score to 5-2 heading into the break.
The Chargers trimmed the deficit to two goals out of halftime as Dylan Wooten scored on an outside shot. However, the Dons then got two goals within a minute of each other from Foster to give him a hat trick and his team a 7-3 lead.
Dos Pueblos’ offense then found some life shortly after as Adam Paredes and Wansor scored in quick succession of each other to cut the deficit to 7-5 with 6:24 on the clock.
That score held through the end of the third, with the Charger defense making several big stops down the stretch to keep it close.
“I think we were playing way too soft in the first half defensively. It was not the play the way that we play defense,” Martinez said. “That was the message to the defense – we had to get more aggressive, we had to be pressing out. We had to be making life more uncomfortable for their offensive players.
“That paid dividends. We got a lot of turnovers in the second half. That’s how we need to be playing the whole game.”
However, Santa Barbara High took complete control of the fourth quarter, controlling the pace of play and shutting Dos Pueblos out in the final 12 minutes to complete the victory.
“One of the keys was gonna be possessing the ball,” Keogh said. “When we have the ball, their defense gets tired, and then vice versa, when they’re on offense, our defense could play a little bit more aggressively.
“Our guys were excited and ready to play super hard on the defensive end.”
The Dons’ final score came from Jackson with 8:04 left in the game to bring it to its final score of 8-5.
Dos Pueblos will host Thacher on Thursday at 5 p.m., while Santa Barbara High will host Saugus on Saturday at 6 p.m. for a non-league contest.