It was a historic night in Fayetteville Friday night, when the Whitewater Lady Wildcats played their first-ever varsity lacrosse match at Wildcat Stadium.

The Decatur Lady Bulldogs prevented Whitewater from celebrating its special night with a victory, coming from behind to defeat the Lady Wildcats 11-9.

It was an impressive match for fledgling Whitewater, especially considering it was squaring off against an established team like Decatur.

“I thought the girls played very well,” Whitewater coach Amie LaPorte said. “We made some mistakes, but once they were brought to the girls’ attention, they made corrections. I don’t think there are many first-year teams that could have done as well as we did tonight.”

Alicia Logan’s match-opening goal was the first scored in the history of Wildcat Stadium, which gave the Lady Wildcats an early 1-0 lead, and she later became the first lacrosse player in school history to record a hat trick. Katie Ferrell almost became the second Whitewater player to record a hat trick, but she finished just short with two goals. Logan and Ferrell combined to score more than half of Whitewater’s goals.

In addition to the one lead it held, Whitewater tied the match five times. The last tie occurred following back-to-back goals within one minute by Farrell and Logan with 16:16 left in the second half. Decatur answered with back-to-back goals of its own to grab a 10-8 lead.

Whitewater’s Megan Dorriety scored to cut Decatur’s lead to one, but that’s as close as the feisty Lady Wildcats would get.

LaPorte feels the future is bright for her inexperienced Lady Wildcats.

“I’m very excited about my team,” LaPorte said. “I think we’re going to do fairly well in our region.”

Other players who scored for Whitewater were Courtney Winslett, Caitlin Baird and Liz Webb, who also had an assist. Goalkeeper Bryttany Uy had 14 saves for Whitewater.

With extremely high expectations, the McIntosh boys varsity lacrosse team opened the season with impressive victories over Etowah, 13-3, and perennial State Power Lassiter, 14-13. Having defeating Westminster in an earlier scrimmage, 10-4, beating Lassiter and now facing Alpharetta, the Chiefs will have faced both teams in last year’s championship, and this year’s No. 1-ranked Alpharetta all in the first two weeks of the 2008 campaign.

All of last year’s highly ranked offense returns with even more experience. Led by DJ Ward, seven goals, and Zach Ward, five goals, the team has had a remarkable 10 different players score in just two games. Caleb Benson, four goals, Brennen Ott, four goals, Jack Bornhofen, three goals, and Brian Huefner, JD Krehel, Garrett Lee, Kell Harrison and Cam Elward also all found the net last week.

In the anticipated early showdown of preseason favorites in front of a packed Lassiter crowd at “The Frank” Stadium on Saturday, the Chiefs fell behind 6-4 at the end of the first quarter and 7-5 at the half. Due to an unexpected illness of starting goalie Andrew Huffman, Kevin Bennett, a true freshman, was called to start in goal in an almost impossible situation. But after the first quarter, he began to gain composure and confidence and was stellar the rest of the way with strong defensive support from Carl Schuemann and David Bexley.

Struggling with mistakes against Lassiter, midway through the third quarter McIntosh fell even farther behind, 10-6 to the 2006 state champs. Following a key timeout, the Chiefs had seen enough. Led by the Ward brothers and Benson, they began the dramatic comeback with quick passes and a team-oriented desire to win. Ott and Lee began to control the face-offs, as the momentum began to shift and Bornhofen helped put it away with critical goals in the fourth quarter. The Lassiter faithful left the stadium quietly as the Chiefs had pulled off the most dramatic come-from-behind victory in the short four-year history of the program.

McIntosh continues the season at home this Thursday at 5 p.m. facing rival Alpharetta, currently ranked No. 1 in the state. Tickets are available at the gate.

Starr’s Mill’s girls kicked off their varsity lacrosse season at home Thursday night against Northgate. It was the first area game for both teams this season.

Senior Sarah Risley led Starr’s Mill’s effort, scoring six of the Lady Panthers 20 goals. Also contributing to the Panthers’ goals with three goals each were senior Cerena Wondersee and juniors Sarah Jagstadt and Alix Stanley. Sophomore Logan Harris and senior Cortney Putters each contributed two goals apiece, beating Northgate 20-6. In goal, junior Katie Smith had four saves for SMHS and senior Olivia Cathcart had two saves in the goal.

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