Boys lax: Foothill Clinches EBAL Crown With 10-4 Victory

Foothill 10, Amador Valley 4

Records: Foothill (18-4, 12-3 EBAL), Amador Valley (13-6, 10-4) 

The Stars: Foothill goalies Ben Krebs and Patrick Shevelson combined to make 18 saves.

The Turning Point:  Foothill opened the game with a 2-0 lead and never looked back. 

The Quote: "(Krebs) is a real leader on the team," Foothill coach Bob McManus said. "He's a good goal stopper and really gives the team a big lift with his play out of goal." 

Who's Next? Both teams will begin the North Coast Section playoffs on Wednesday.

The Bottom Line: Foothill will share the East Bay Athletic League title with De La Salle — which beat Cal 17-6 on Friday — however, the Falcons swept DLS during the season to claim the tiebreaker and will have home field during the playoffs.

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Foothill High boys lacrosse coach Bob McManus knows a lot of things can change in a year, but his team's rise from a middle-of-the-pack East Bay Athletic League team to the league champions and North Coast Section favorites still seems like a big jump.

In a 10-4 win at rival Amador Valley on Friday, the Falcons completed that transformation. 

"I'll tell you a big difference from last year," McManus said. "We had two players out all last year as juniors: Ross Porter (defenseman) and Seth Benson (midfielder). Those guys we're with us all this year and both of them are outstanding players and that's a huge lift to the team."

The Falcons (18-4, 12-3 EBAL) were dominant from the get-go, controlling the pace on both sides of the field. They led 6-2 at halftime and outscored Amador in every quarter.

Porter and Benson led a physical Foothill defense which bullied the Amador attack all game.  Foothill's stifling defense allowed few good scoring chances for the Dons and made life easy for goalies Ben Krebs and Patrick Shevelson, who combined to make 18 saves.

"I had a good defense in front of me; they played well the whole game. They came all fired up and finished fired up, that was awesome," Krebs said. "We came out and let them have a couple of shots here and there but they were nothing special, that was a big part of it."

Shevelson, whose lone action came in the second quarter, allowed one goal and made four saves.

"I thought the whole team played really well and everything clicked," Shevelson said.

McManus was proud of both of their efforts, but praised Krebs highly on his leadership skills.

"Ben's a real leader on the team," McManus said. "He's a good goal stopper and really gives the team a big lift with his play out of goal."

Amador (18-4, 12-3) got within a goal of the Falcons with six minutes, 50 seconds left in the first quarter after Mitch Flaherty scored the first of his two first half goals, but it was as close as the Dons ever got.

"Well, we got outhustled, and outplayed, and out coached," Amador coach Rory Manley  said. "You got to hand it to Foothill, they're EBAL champs. They outplayed us tonight. Their goalies played terrific and I think that was the difference. Our goalie played good, he was fine, but their goalies were terrific, both of them."

Flaherty thought his team played hard, but not hard enough against Foothill.

"We didn't have a full team effort, that doesn't really win games," Flaherty said. "We got to play on all cylinders."

The NCS playoff brackets will be released on Sunday.

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Foothill 10, Amador Valley 4

Foothill (18-4, 12-3) 4 2 3 1 — 10
Amador Valley (13-6, 10-4) 1 1 1 1 — 4

Scoring: Foothill — Dutcher 2, Lambrecht 2, Schall 3, Kacinski, Garcia, Wheaton. Amador — Flaherty 2, Busch, Chen.

Saves: Krebs (F) 14, Shevelson 4 (F); De Luca (AV) 12

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