By: Carolyn M. Hartko
A historic 9-6 victory over Notre Dame last Friday and a 10-1 romp over Somerville on Tuesday have the South Brunswick High School boys’ varsity lacrosse team rolling along with a 7-2 record.
The win over Notre Dame, a Curcio Division rival, was the first in the history of the rivalry between ND and the Vikings. "That’s a good thing for your program, to make sure another program doesn’t have the upper hand on you, year-in-and-year-out," Viking head coach Mark Ziminski said. "That was a nice step for us, to show them that they’re not going to beat us every year. It was a nice win for us, and it wasn’t an easy win either."
The Vikings had a slim 2-1 lead after the first quarter, but outscored Notre Dame 4-2 in the second period. Senior attackman Dan Niemczyk, who finished the game with six goals, netted two in that quarter. The three-goal edge at halftime held up as the two sides played evenly during the second half. Sophomore Kory Kelly put away two goals, and Chris Laurita posted one.
"We came ready to play," Ziminski said. "I think our extra-man’s been really sharp lately, but we still need to work on some defensive things. We’re making too many errors, which create offense for (the opponent). But I thought we came to play. We played hard and we kept our focus, for the most part."
When the Vikings were up 7-0 after the first quarter on Tuesday, Ziminski knew he had a much different game on his hands. He used the remainder of that contest to give some second string players more field time, and had his offense work on ball control.
"We tried to work on our two minute offense at the end of the game, because we’ve had trouble in tight games possessing the ball in the last two minutes," the coach said. "Today, we actually held the ball for about 3 ½ minutes. We worked on our two minute offense, our possession offense, and our motion offense. It was good for us. We basically had the all-sophomore attack in and our second midfield line, which is two freshmen and one junior. So, they got a lot of playing time to work on that kind of stuff, too."
Senior first middie Ian Muchanic paced the offense with his first hat trick of the season. Niemczyk had two. Senior Mike Bell notched his first varsity goal, and Kelly, Nick Gazzale, Shane Foley and Anthony Osborne netted one apiece. Matt Rubel made three saves during the first three quarters of the game. Anthony Quaranta made his varsity debut for the fourth quarter, but went unchallenged in the net.
Ziminski used the Somerville match to demonstrate that teams can learn something from every game, and that it’s not necessary to grind an opponent into the dust.
"I remember what it was like seven years ago when teams used to run up the score on us," the coach said. "And we’re not going to be about that in this program. We’re going to show some sportsmanship, and that’s why we try to do what we can to make sure the game is fair, even when we have the upper hand the whole way."
The Vikings have a more relaxed schedule for the remainder of the regular season. They have added Mt. Olive to the schedule Monday at home, then have three Friday games in a row.
"We’re playing fewer games this year so we can prepare a little better in between," Ziminski said. "Last year we had a situation where we had to play four games in five days, and it’s just too hard on the kids. I think we’re better prepared, and more refreshed, the way we’re doing it this year."

