Freshmen lead Twin Valley boys lacrosse over Eastern York, to first District 3 playoff win

May 24—The kids are all right at Twin Valley. In fact, they're better than all right, they're groundbreaking.

Backed by 10 goals from freshmen, the sixth-seeded Raiders defeated 11th-seeded Eastern York 16-11 in a District 3 Class 2A boys lacrosse first-round matchup Tuesday for the first district win in program history.

Twin Valley will play at third-seeded Lampeter-Strasburg (15-3) on Thursday in the quarterfinal at 7 p.m.

"It's a testament to the youth program," Raiders coach Andrew Doupe said. "This is my first year here and the coaches from elementary through middle school develop these guys. It's a testament to their (the players) hard work too; these guys grind just about all year. I was hired in June and we started offseason workouts in July and guys started showing up buying in right away.

"They've earned this and they're gonna earn all the success that continues to come to them over the next couple of years."

Indeed, the young core drove the breakthrough win on Tuesday as five of the Raiders' six second-half goals came from freshmen and sophomores, and freshman Cooper Glass scored five goals in the first half to help Twin Valley establish a 10-6 halftime lead.

"To be a freshman and be a part of the first district win in Twin Valley history is huge," Glass said, "My teammates really helped us out and pulled through this one; we created great opportunities. It really opens the gates and shows what we can do in the future.

"It's such a great feeling to know I have three more years to go accomplish even more."

The historic accomplishment was in jeopardy as a resilient Golden Knights squad kept the pressure on the Raiders (13-5) throughout the second half.

A tight third quarter ended on a buzzer-beating goal from freshman Drew Engle that gave the Raiders a 12-7 lead, but Eastern York (10-9) stormed back by scoring four unanswered over the next seven minutes.

Adam Myers scored a team-high four goals for the Golden Knights and got his fourth to make it 12-11 with 4:41 to go. Twin Valley committed three penalties in the fourth, helping propel Eastern York's comeback.

"I think that was our age showing in that comeback," Doupe said. "We started taking a couple of dumb penalties, making some bad decisions because we're a little young and haven't been here before. So we weathered that storm and we knew that if we just got the ball down to the offensive end, we had pretty easy success the whole day.

"So we just needed to kill some penalties, give our offense a chance and we had full confidence that they would put the ball in the back of the net."

With the pressure on, the Raiders did not falter as freshman Colin Gallagher scored with 4:07 left and again with 3:30 left to put the Raiders up three.

Patrick Shanahan, who had a team-high three assists, scored with 3:02 left to make it 15-11.

Sophomore Anthony Crisi closed out the scoring with 1:13 left.

"Drew Engle is a freshman and led our team in points this year," Doupe said, "Cooper Glass is a freshman that had over 40 points. Colin Gallagher got bumped up a little bit but if he wouldn't have missed a couple games he would have been a guy right around 40 points, too. The defense is all sophomores, with a couple of juniors mixed in there; we're young."

"I feel like we all started at a really young age, and we all just kept playing up together through club and stuff like that," Glass said. "So it's just knowing each other's game and we know how to play well with each other."

In addition to the young scorers, sophomore goalie Dylan Corros had a big day, ending with 14 saves. Corros made six saves during the third quarter and three in the fourth to help maintain the lead for Twin Valley.

"He's (Corros) awesome," Doupe said. "He makes what we call the bonus saves. He makes the ones that most coaches aren't banking on their goalie to make. Sometimes he gets in his own head because he expects himself to be great and gets disappointed when it's not perfect, but he did more than enough to get us to win tonight. So I'm proud of him."

Not to be forgotten, the upperclassmen provided their fair share of contributions, too.

Junior Ethan Ameisen scored three goals, including the first of the second half for the Raiders. Ameisen also had two goals in the second quarter. Danny Murphy, also a junior, scored two goals, including the game's first, and had an assist.

Fellow junior Ean Winchester, an All-Berks wrestler and two-time All-Berks lacrosse selection, dominated the faceoff, consistently winning possessions and jumpstarting the offense. Winchester also had an assist.

"He's a special athlete, big body and intimidating guy, but one of the sweetest kids you'll ever meet," Doupe said of Winchester. "I don't want to say he's a teddy bear because you can see he can be pretty physical out there. He's a good kid, loves to go out and scrap and play hard. He's first team all-county. His (faceoff) percentage this year is around 85%, which is unheard of.

"It's been huge; you just get that many more extra possessions. It (the faceoff) is a monumental part of the game and he's one of the best I've ever seen do it."

Glass scored two goals in the first quarter and three in the second. The Raiders defeated the Golden Knights 10-7 in the regular season, which marked a turning point for Glass, Doupe said. Glass had one goal and one assist in that matchup.

"Honestly, Cooper went through a little bit of a cold streak," Doupe said. "When we played Eastern York previously, he was on a cold streak of finishing, so I think that put a chip on his shoulder. Now that he's through it, he's putting that thing in the back of the net every single time he gets a chance.

"Young freshman, understands the game at a very high level, and knows how to take good space, and he has the skills to, if given an opportunity, complete it. Back to our freshman class. Again, it's young and special and he's definitely one of them."

Heading into the quarterfinal, the Raiders' confidence is at a high, but Twin Valley knows it faces a tough test against the Pioneers.

"Now we'll get our name out a little more," Glass said. "That's gonna be huge for us now that we're all super confident."

"They got some super talented guys going to play Division I," Doupe said. "We know we got a test but that's what we're here for, right? So it's all about going out there and putting our best game together."