High School: Day 3 results at the Langkammerer

SI         10
Brophy   2

St. Margaret's Episcopal 18
Bellarmine                      12

Sacred Heart Prep   10
Marin Catholic        13

Lincoln              5
Redwood         10

High School: Langkammerer Day 2 results

Bellarmine 11
Redwood    4

Brophy (AZ) 8
SHP              7 (OT)

St. Ignatius       18
Lincoln (OR)     4

St. Margaret's    11
Marin Catholic   5

High School: 2013 Jerry Langkammerer Invitational

Jerry Langkammerer Invitational Trophy

The 7th annual Jerry Langkammerer Invitational will take place at St. Ignatius' J. B. Murphy Field on April 4th, 5th, and 6th, 2013. Eight terrific teams, from three states, and from both NorCal and SoCal will participate. The Langkammerer is, without question, the best in-season Lacrosse tournament in the Western United States.

Here is the list of participating teams:
School                                               State    Rank in State    LaxPower Power ranking
Bellarmine College Prep                     CA            30                  93.76
Brophy College Prep                          AZ              1                  97.32
Marin Catholic                                    CA              2                  99.14
Lincoln HS                                         OR             20                 91.96
Redwood HS                                      CA              7                  98.69
Sacred Heart Prep                               CA             46                 92.39
St. Ignatius College Prep                    CA              1                   99.18
St. Margaret's Epsicopal School         CA             56                  91.98


My schedule will not allow me to attend the Langkammerer this year. It will be the first one I've ever missed. Feeling very depressed about that!

Here's the schedule for the Langkammerer:
       

	Thursday Apr 4			Friday Apr 5			Saturday Apr 6
12:00 turf	Brophy vs  Bellarmine		12:00 turf	SI vs Lincoln		11:00 tuf	Lincoln vs Redwood
12:15 grass	Marin Catholic vs Lincoln		12:15 grass	SHP vs Brophy		11:15 grass	Bellarmine vs St. Margs
2:00 Turf	St. Margarets vs SHP		2:00	St. Margs vs Marin Catholic		1:00 turf	SI vs Brophy
			turf
330 Turf	SI vs Redwood		330 turf	Redwood vs Bellarmine		1:15 grass	SHP vs Marin Catholic

The usual caveats apply: Times and fields can change. Check in with coaches daily for any changes to the schedule.

Day 3 at the Langkammerer

The final day at the Langkammerer saw three teams trying to protect their undefeated records at the tournament. Brophy Prep, Corona Del Mar, and St. Ignatius entered the third day with 2-0 records. The #1 team in the Southern Section of California, Corona Del Mar, faced a rapidly improving Bellarmine team - perennial power of the Central Coast Section of CA - and St. Ignatius faced the #1 team in Arizona - Brophy Prep in what everyone knew would be quite the battle. The SI vs BP battle was particularly heady, since both teams entered this game undefeated.

Let's get the scores behind us. Corona Del Mar (CDM) defeated Bellarmine 7-4, while St. Ignatius (SI) defeated Brophy Prep, 8-6. Both were sensational games to watch, with speed, skill, and will to win evident on both sides of the field! Bellarmine held the lead 1-0 and 2-1 before CDM went on a big run led by Michael Keasey, but Bellarmine fought every minute of the game and CDM knew they'd been in a big-time battle. SI smoothly pulled out to a 4-1 halftime lead, only to see Brophy close the gap to end the game at 8-6. Brock Ghelfi was one of two "Players of the Game," in my opinion, with 4 goals and an assist in the game with SI. Will McKee, SI's exceptional Face-off guys was the other. Will has been dominant in every game but one this season and yesterday was no exception. All those extra possessions made a big difference in this game.

Two teams ended up undefeated – Corona Del Mar and St. Ignatius – with Brophy Prep hard on the heels of CDM and SI.

In a non-scientific – and alphabetic – way, the teams I most enjoyed watching were:

Bellarmine – most improved team over early season form
Brophy Prep – willful, never-say-die team with a stud carrying them. Very impressive group of young men.
Corona Del Mar – in my opinion the most athletic team at the Langkammerer
Marin Catholic – not the best record in the tourney, but one of two teams with great grit and tenacity. One of two teams I found myself unexpectedly rooting for!
San Clemente – the other team with amazing grit and tenacity that I rooted for through most of the tournament!
St. Ignatius - I liked the Wildcats because their combination of skill, speed, and balance allowed them to make it look easy on numerous occasions. Making it look easy, I've found, is almost always because of near-infinite practice. They were the smoothest team at the Langkammerer.

Day 1 of the Langkammerer

Here's an incomplete – and sketchy – report on Day 1 of the Langkammerer.

Brophy Prep (AZ)  6 Bellarmine (CCS CA) 3 Either Bellarmine's getting better or Brophy had an off game. This spread is smaller than I expected.

Marin Catholic 14 Serra 6 This IS about what I expected. Marin Catholic is a very nice team that seeks to find the open man on the crease. They are successful in this and that's why they're good on offense. They are energetic and relentless on defense and that creates offensive opportunities. This is a team I have grown to like. I like Serra, too. They are just earlier on the development curve than Marin Catholic.

St, Ignatius (CCS) 13 Monte Vista (NCS) 4. This is about what I had expected. Well, it was 1 goal less differential than I expected, and if the refs had not mistakenly excluded a goal by SI I would have been right on the money. SI's Will McKee continues his amazing performance at the foX, The D unit is superbly coordinated and the midfield produced a few nice goals, including a big rip from 10 yards by Phil Alimam. The SI Attack line is the best I have ever seen, in CA – possibly beyond. They are all interchangeable in skills, feeding, and finishing. What that means is when an opponent puts their top pole on, say, JW MCGovern, Poles 2 & 3 face Attackmen who are functionally equivalent. Here's my premise: There is almost always a hierarchy of talent among any Close D unit and in an Attack unit that is good (and equal in skill) the Attackman covered by the weakest Pole will have a BIG day! If you have not seen this Attack line – Chad Cohan, Joe Lang, JW McGovern –  you are missing something special. You owe it to yourself to see these three this season. In an earlier post, I suggested this might be – in quotes – "an interesting game." The outcome was about as expected. The Mustangs are a well-coached team, with a number of fine players, but – this year – they were not a strong match for the Wildcats.

Corona Del Mar 15 – Menlo School 5. It was 3-0 CDM when I left things didn't get any better for Menlo. CDM is big, fast, smart, and unselfish. Their offensive QB, Mike Keasey, is smart, fast, and versatile. The Sea Kings are a very good team! The kind of team whose smarts, ball movement, and physicality makes them a WOW team to watch. Menlo is a smart team, with nice stick skills. The kind of team you want to do well. Against many teams the attributes of smart and skilled can carry the day. Today they ran into a team that is also smart and skilled, but has additional attributes of size and speed. Menlo rarely underperforms expectation, and they did not underperform today. The computers said they lose by about 10 goals and that's the way it turned out. I'm a fan of Menlo lacrosse and will watch them again this season!

More tomorrow on a VERY entertaining Langkammerer.