Tigers Beat Rye, Roll Past Suffern

PUTNAM VALLEY—The Putnam Valley High boys lacrosse team erased a 4-1 deficit and came back to beat Rye, 9-5, Saturday on the road, and the Tigers ripped Suffern, 12- 4, in a game played at PV the prior Thursday.

Saturday at Rye (4-2), the Garnets went up 4-1 at halftime. But the Tigers re-grouped and out-scored Rye 8-1 in the second half to earn the win.

Kevin Christopher had a breakout game with five goals for the Tigers (3-0), Dan O’Gorman added two goals and one assist, and Shane Kelly and Ryan Fitzgerald each had a goal.

Brendan McCrudden had 13 saves for PV, and Mike Linehan stopped 10 shots on goal for Rye.

Tigers coach Brian Kuczma watched his team commit penalty after penalty in the first half, resulting in three man-up goals for Rye.

“We spent most of the first half in the penalty box,” Kuczma said. “We had seven penalties… we just didn’t get any momentum going offensively. At halftime we talked about cleaning up our game, possessing the ball.. and once we did that, we slowed our game down and all our players got to work. O’Gorman did an excellent job on faceoffs, and Kelly got us going with the first goal in the third period. And that had to be a big confidence-builder for Christopher.”

Against Suffern (2-2), the Tigers got out to a fast start, and led 7-1 after one quarter. Suffern closed it to a 7-3 game at halftime, but PV won the second half, 5-1.

Fitzgerald led the Tigers with five goals and three assists, Christopher added a hat-trick and had an assist, Johnny van de Veerdonk had two goals and one assist, O’Gorman handed out three assists and Kelly had two assists.

McCrudden stopped nine shots in net for the Tigers.

“We got off to a great start, then got a little sloppy,” Kuczma said. “But our offense took control, and that gave us confidence. In the second quarter we had over five minutes of penalties… But Ryan shot well, and Kelly did, too. Both of them were outstanding from outside.”

Putnam Valley was set to travel to face Lakeland/Panas at Lakeland HS today (Thursday) at 6:30 p.m., and the Tigers host Fox Lane Saturday at 1 p.m.