WAKEFIELD — The Wakefield High boys’ lacrosse team won their season-opener on Tuesday at Landrigan Field, shutting down Arlington for the majority of the game on their way to a 7-3 victory and a 1-0 start to the 2024 season.
“It was a great start to the season,” said Wakefield’s first-year head coach Andy Wells. “We certainly have things to clean up as we move along but the effort and passion showed up which is a great sign.”
The defense set the tone early and never let the visiting Spy Ponders back into the game, allowing just one goal through the first three quarters.
Wakefield’s freshman goalie Jaden Fullerton finished with 13 saves in his debut.
“The key to game was our defense first and foremost,” said Wells. “We talked pre-game about how we needed to defend Arlington and everyone executed just the way we asked. Arlington has a lot of offensive firepower. Tommy DeFeo (defenseman) had a tough assignment against their best attackman and Jaden Fullerton was locked in all game long and made some huge saves for us.”
In the fourth, when the visitors were finally getting their offense rolling with two consecutive goals, it was DeFeo and a resilient defense also including players like JP Casey, Robbie Kimball and Cam Sartori who made multiple hustle plays to clear the zone and make sure the momentum never shifted.
Perhaps fittingly, it was Fullerton who had the final say, squaring up one last Arlington bid before the buzzer went off.
Offensively, the Warriors did a nice job of maintaining possession and finishing when they needed to, especially on the advantage. Wakefield was led by Nick Metsis (4 goals), Seamus Cable (3 goals) and Matt Keefe (2 assists) on that end.
“Offensively, we got a few early man-up opportunities and made them count which definitely built the confidence in the team,” said Wells. “The rest of the game we just stayed the course and ran our offense and we knew if we did that we’d start to break through which is what happened. Arlington’s defense definitely makes you earn everything, there are no easy possessions against them so the emphasis pre-game was to stay patient and play our game.
“We had huge nights from Nick Metsis and Seamus Cable but their opportunities to score came up because everyone on our offense just did their job.”
With the score 6-3 and 4:35 left, it was Cable who essentially put the game out of reach with the final goal, recovering a turnover from the Arlington goalie after some good pressure by Brady Walsh on a ride and finishing before the goalie could recover.
In the end, it was an impressive start to the season for the Warriors.
Wakefield’s game in Woburn scheduled for yesterday was postponed. Their next matchup is on Wednesday against Belmont, 4:30 p.m. at Landrigan Field.