Domination is not what you would expect out of any state championship contest, but that’s just what transpired Saturday at Invesco Field at Mile High.
The Cherry Creek boys lacrosse team, paced by Peter Hoselton’s first career hat trick, captured its second consecutive state title and 11th overall by easily defeating East 6-2.
The Bruins (14-4) scored six unanswered goals after the Angels (17-2) opened the scoring late in the first quarter.
At the same venue last month, East beat Cherry Creek 7-6 in a regular-season match that preceded a University of Colorado-Colorado State game. The state championship game served as the opener to a doubleheader with the first Denver Outlaws professional match.
“It’s good to get away with this one,” Cherry Creek coach Bryan Perry said while his players’ celebration held up pregame warm-ups for the ensuing Major League Lacrosse game.
“We felt like the last time we played these guys we just did not have the pieces to the puzzle together yet. We knew by the time the playoffs came around we would have it together, and we did.”
Cherry Creek outshot East 16-7 in the first half, including 10-3 in shots on goal. Hoselton tied it at 1-1 with 10:37 to play in the second quarter and later gave the Bruins leads of 4-1 and 5-1.
“I’ve never had a hat trick in my life, eight years of playing lacrosse,” Hoselton said. “I don’t know what happened.”
The senior midfielder, who did not know his goal total for the season, added: “The goals on our team are so spread out, nobody really keeps track of that. It’s about everybody contributing and everybody sharing goals.”
Midfielder Dane Mueller, attack Charlie Will and defenseman Marty Taffet also scored for the Bruins. Freshman middie Patrick Murray and sophomore attack Josh Russell tallied for the Angels, who scored the game’s first and last goals but still turned in their worst offensive performance of the season.
“I don’t know if they took us out of our game so much as we took ourselves out of it,” East coach Jon Barocas said. “I don’t know what it was tonight, but the offense just did not click tonight like they did all year.”
Perry said the game was decided with groundballs.
“We really dominated groundballs, and I think whenever you dominated play between the boxes like that, teams are going to have a tough time scoring,” he said.
“And the kids really hustled. I thought it was going to be a little closer, but we got up on them and they didn’t have any answers, and (our) kids kept on playing hard.”
Said Hoselton, “We knew that we would play that hard for 48 minutes, and when you play that hard for 48 minutes, that’s the outcome.”
Denver East 1 0 0 1 – 2
Cherry Creek 0 4 1 1 – 6
Scoring: First quarter – East, Murray , 4:52.
Second quarter – Cherry Creek, Hoselton, 10:37. Cherry Creek, Mueller (McKinstry), 7:23. Cherry Creek, Will (Kerr), 5:54. Cherry Creek, Hoselton (Driver), 3:18.
Third quarter – Cherry Creek, Hoselton (Bolling), 5:51.
Fourth quarter – Cherry Creek, Taffett, 7:08. East, Russell, 1:19.
Saves – E: Dudley (16). CC: Stone (7).
Mike Chambers can be reached at 303-820-5453 or mchambers@denverpost.com.
