Totino-Grace Boys Lacrosse Team Has a Tough Act to Follow

The question now is what do the Eagles of Totino-Grace do for an encore?

had perhaps its finest season ever in boys lacrosse last spring, advancing all the way to the lacrosse tournament state finals before bowing 7-3 to in the championship game.

When the Eagles take the field for their first game Thursday, they will be without 16 seniors and many of the star players from that 15-4 team.

Among the missing: senior defensemen Kyle Mork and Joe Hockert, midfielders Giuseppe Palermo and Nick Colpitts, and three-year starting goalie Ryan Zellinger.

Mork and Palermo were Minnesota All-Americans. Mork, Hockert, Palermo and Colpitts were named to either the first or second 2010 all-state teams, while Mork and Zellinger were named to the state boys lacrosse all-tournament team.

Growing Pains
So color the Eagles green, at least for a while this season. That’s going to be the biggest early hurdle for Totino-Grace to overcome.

“Obviously, first and foremost, has got to be inexperience, would be our biggest weakness” said head coach Justin Hoban. “I look at this roster and I see some guys that can play, but there’s not many guys with significant varsity time. So we’re going to have significant growing pains I would anticipate during the season.”

Hoban sees team defense as a strength this season.

“Despite losing a couple of All-Americans on the defensive end, I actually like our defensive core,” said Hoban. "It’s not super deep. We probably only go four or five that are really, truly ready for varsity play, but they’re all pretty good players and I think we’ll be pretty solid on the back end.”   

A Little Bit of Chemistry
So, while the Eagles lost a lot of exceptional athletes, they also return some talented lacrosse players.

Juniors Sam Harris and Connor Perez and seniors Nick Paidosch and Cole Davidowski are expected to lead the defense.

“I really feel we have the work ethic to go a long ways,” said Paidosch. “A lot of these guys have been playing together for a long time, maybe not at the varsity level but at JV and I feel we have a little bit of chemistry between us some of us.”

Younger Guns
Seth Noble, Totino-Grace’s only returning midfielder, should pace the offense. The Eagles graduated eight of nine midfielders. Returning attack men include Frank Nesser and Jason Peltier.

“We’ll be good again,” said Noble. “It will take a little bit to get the younger guns to get some experience under their belt. But they’ve definitely got potential so once they hit that experience, the varsity, get them used to the pace, we’ll definitely have a chance at a conference, state run again.”

“A lot of guys haven’t had the experience, but we have a lot coming back,” said Jason Peltier.

Totino-Grace’s depth should be better this year, Noble said.

“Last year we relied on our top five middies a lot and our top three defense, but this year’s we’ve got a lot more depth at defense and middies,” said Noble. “We have almost three full lines of middies that run and play and compete.”

Top Teams
Benilde-St. Margaret’s, , Eden Prairie, and Wayzata are expected to be top teams this season, but there are several others who could surprise. The Eagles are hoping they’re among them.

“Eden Prairie will be the team to beat right now,” said Hoban. “They’ve been building for this year for a little while. I still think that Benilde will be very good. They’re rock solid in goal. Their midfield was the deepest in the state last year and I know their attack got all the fanfare last year with (Bailey) Dodds and (Ryan) Butts. The bottom line was, the reason they destroyed everybody was they had a better, deeper midfield than anybody.”

Two big games for the Eagles will be May 10 against Benilde-St. Margaret’s and May 17 against Blake.

State Tournament Rematch
Totino-Grace hosts Thursday to open the season in a game starting at 7:15 p.m. Those same two teams met in one of the state semifinals last season, with Totino-Grace winning a tight 4-3 decision.

Most lacrosse watchers won’t be picking Totino-Grace to return to the state finals. That hasn’t stopped the Eagles from thinking it could happen again.

“Yes, it’s hard to get back there,” said Peltier. “I think, just progress through the season and see where that takes us. Maybe win a few games in the conference and maybe get to state.”