There's so much lacrosse news to cover, you'd think it was May.
In the recent Olympics, the Canadian hockey team lost to the United States in round-robin play, leading to massive speculation that they would disappoint. They met the Americans again in the finals and won the gold medal. Well, at the World Lacrosse Championships, pretty much the exact same thing happened...just in reverse.
The US avenged an earlier loss to Canada by defeating their northern neighbors 15-10 to win the title. Ryan Powell, who was the only remaining Powell Brother not to have won a gold medal, can finally celebrate.
Two hours after the fact, Ryan Powell had yet to share his joy with brothers Casey and Mike. He was too busy celebrating.
"He has 24 new brothers now," Team USA goalie Brian Dougherty said. "He’s been celebrating with them."
The cause for the party was Team USA’s 12-10 victory over Team Canada on Saturday in the Federation of International Lacrosse world championship final before a crowd of 4,651 in Manchester, England. The victory avenged a 15-10 upset four years ago to the defending-champion Canadians and a 10-9 loss a week ago to them in pool play.
Of the eleven World Championships played, the U.S. has now won nine (Canada has the other two). With the 2014 tournament being held in Denver, Colorado, things look good for another one.
Former Orange Mike Leveille was named to the All-Tournament Team.
The Australians finished in third, Japan fourth and the host nation England finished fifth. Technically-speaking, he Iroquois Nation finished in 30th place, dead last, but we all know why that's so (Mexico was actually the worst performer...).
Back in the U.S., the Empire Games are in full swing and there was a shocker in the lacrosse category on Friday, thanks to a soon-to-be-Syracuse lax player.
In a showdown of unbeaten boys' lacrosse powers, an overtime goal by Syracuse University-bound Tom Grimm from Carthage furnished Central with a stunning 8-7 victory over Long Island at the Empire State Games at Canisius College in Buffalo Friday night.
Central (4-0) opened up a 5-0 lead early, only to see four-time defending tourney champion Long Island (3-1) close its deficit to 5-4. The score see-sawed the remainder of regulation play, which ended in a 7-7 tie.
Central won the faceoff to start overtime and held the ball for more than minute before a shot was then missed. However, Carthage's All-Central New York player, Grimm, secured the rebound and laced a high hard shot from the right side into the net 2:06 into the overtime session, setting off a wild celebration on the Central sidelines.
Is Grimm Reaper too easy? I don't care. When you get something like that dropped in your lap, you run with it. He shall hereby be known as Syracuse's Grimm Reaper. Done.