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Guerin Favreau and teammate Sean McCusker (26) work on Montville’s Sean Ventresca in a 13-3 win over the Indians April 4. Photo by Marc Allard.



The Woodstock Academy Centaurs boys’ lacrosse team experienced the two extremes in its first week of play; a tough loss and an easy win.
The Centaurs evened their record at 1-1 April 4 with a 13-3 win over Montville.
That followed on the heels of a 16-5 season-opening loss to East Lyme April 1.
“It’s kind of tough losing the opener by a lot, so it was nice to have a little rebound game like this,” sophomore Guerin Favreau said after the win over Montville.
The Centaurs certainly had the motivation.
“We didn’t forget last year. We lost to (Montville) twice in overtime. This feels a lot better than that,” said Woodstock Academy coach Michael Noel said. The Centaurs fell to Montville on its home field last year, 6-5, and encountered a similar fate at home, losing to the Indians, 7-6.
There was to be no repeat of that April 4. The Centaurs made sure of that early.
Ethan Holcomb broke out of Woodstock Academy’s defensive end with the ball early in the contest and carried it downfield. There, he found the waiting stick of Ethan Haass who shoveled it past Montville keeper Steve Turchetta for a 1-0 lead just 1 minute, 51 seconds into the game.
The Centaurs found the net again just 51 seconds later when Favreau, unassisted, put the first of his three goals in.
Montville (0-1) responded with a goal from Sean Ventresca, the first of his two for the Indians in the game. It was aided and abetted by the Centaurs who were called for not one, not two, but three penalties that were all being served concurrently.
But Woodstock Academy established its dominance with two more goals before the break against the undermanned Indians.
Both of those goals came off the stick of Holcomb, who finished with four on the day, to give him six on the season. Holcomb tallied with 1:58 left in the opening quarter and again with 29 seconds to play to put the Centaurs up, 4-1.
Montville suffered another blow to its sideline when one of its players went down on the field, ending his day, and also creating about a 45-minute delay.
The Centaurs were not bothered.
Just 49 seconds into the second quarter, Favreau scored when Ethan Haass passed him the ball from behind the net.
Seth Libby followed with the next two goals, and ended with the hat trick, to make it 7-1 before Derek Debbis countered for Montville.
Holcomb ended the half with a goal off another pass from Haass to make it 8-2 at the break.
The Centaurs finished things up by scoring the first four goals of the third quarter to take the double-digit lead.
While the Centaurs did score 13 goals, all came from just four players; Holcomb, Favreau, Libby and Haass.
“I hope that’s not how we will be all year, but so far, that’s the way it is,” Favreau said of just four players scoring. “Working in the new players is a work in progress, but we’re getting them in there.”
Noel agreed. The Centaurs have to find more offensive threats.
“We need to improve upon that,” Noel said. “I tried to get a lot of the younger guys in for them to get more experience, but we have to take better care of the ball and move it at will. I tried to get these guys to focus on improving their game (Thursday) rather than just racking up the goals, but we do need to get more people involved. Ethan and Guerin will be strong up top, but it has to come from both sides, both below and above the net, you can’t rely on just one.”
Noel said he also saw the need for his player to be looking to cut a little more toward the cage as a host of goals went unassisted and relied more on individual talent than teamwork.
The Centaurs were coming off the loss to the Vikings who will, likely, be the team to beat in the Eastern Connecticut Conference.
Given that, the one-sided loss wasn’t all that bad.
“It was a nightmare opener for us, but I was a little surprised that it wasn’t even more of a lopsided score. I think we saw some decent things out there from our guys that we can actually work on,” said Noel.
Holcomb scored twice in that game with Haass, Libby and Gabe Geyer getting the others.
Noel said one other aspect he has been working on has been the attentiveness of the team.
“We’re trying to mature,” Noel said. “Of course, we want to have fun, but we also want to keep our composure, realize and respect the game of lacrosse. It doesn’t do any good to just come out here and socialize. This is a high school lacrosse team and this team needs to stay focused at all times.”
Marc Allard
Sports Information Director
The Woodstock Academy

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