Sports

Garnets claim Class B crown

A gaudy regular season record might have gifted Rye a top overall postseason seed this year, but heading into Saturday’s Section I championship game against Yorktown, few considered the Garnets to be the favorites. Despite a shaky start, however, the Garnets proved their doubters wrong, downing the Huskers 11-7 to capture the first Class B title in the program’s history.

Caden Whaling makes a move on a Yorktown defender on June 12. Whaling had four goals in Rye’s 11-7 win. Photo/Mike Smith

No. 2-seeded Yorktown stormed out of the gates on June 12, building a 3-1 lead in the first quarter before the Garnets made the decision to switch to a zone defense. That adjustment helped keep the explosive Huskers at bay as the Garnets rattled off five straight goals to take control of the game.

“The guys who do really good things for them were playing well and we played man for the first four minutes and they just burnt us,” Rye coach Steve Lennon said. “It was our plan to start in man just to say we tried it, but we had a quick trigger, went to zone and our guys did that really well.”

Much of the turnaround was also due to the play of Johnny Hartzell who kept Rye in possession of the ball by winning 15-of-22 face-offs. Hartzell’s tenacity was mirrored by his Garnet teammates who knew they would have to play with intensity in order to sink the Huskers, who are Section I’s all-time winningest program. 

“They’re a great team, they’ve had so many great players throughout the years, and we used to lose to them all the time,” Hartzell said. “We came in to this game saying ‘we don’t want to lose’ and knew that with our team it had to be all hustle and grit and that we couldn’t take anything for granted.”

Caden Whaling, who led the Garnet attack with four goals, said that Rye was unfazed by the Huskers hot start, and knew coming in that the championship game would come down to maintaining composure. 

“We knew that we were just going to ride the waves, whether it be lows or highs,” Whaling said. “We just had to stick to the game plan and keep flying around, getting all the balls on the ground and coming out on top.”   

Whaling also noted that, despite Rye’s 13-2 record coming into the game—which included a regular season overtime win over Yorktown—the Huskers’ dominance in recent weeks led many to believe that Yorktown would be able to avenge their earlier loss to Rye, something which served as motivation for the home team. 

“Coming in as the underdog is something we like, we take that personally,” he said. “Coming out, getting a win, proving everyone wrong, that’s what we love.”

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