Oak Park lacrosse team wraps up winning season

New environment, nearly the same results.

Although this past season was the first time the Oak Park High lacrosse team was affiliated with the school- as opposed to playing as a nonaffiliated club team- the Eagles continued to have success in the sport.

Last week Oak Park lost 8-7 in five overtimes to Palos Verdes in the semifinals of the Southern Section Lacrosse Championship.

A year after winning the Southern California Lacrosse Association title and then departing for CIF, Oak Park finished the 2008 season with a 14-5 record

Leading the Eagles was senior Brett Zeolla, also a soccer and football standout at OPHS. Zeolla, a UC Davis commit, had a teamhigh 49 goals and 28 assists entering the postseason.

"Earlier in the year, I heard a lot of people say that Zeolla was hogging the ball because he had so many goals," White said.

"How can he be hogging the ball if he also leads us in assists?"

When asked whether he prefers to make a great pass or score a goal, Zeolla replied, "It doesn't matter, just as long as we win the game."

Some of the players Zeolla set up scoring opportunities for included juniors Grayson Phillips and Ryan Darling, as well as senior Max Ball.

Entering the playoffs, Phillips had 27 goals, while Ball had 26. Darling had 12 goals and 28 assists.

"Darling is a playmaker, and most of the offense runs through him," White said. "Phillips is great because he wins about 90 percent of his faceoffs, so we always started out with the ball."

Other players who contributed offensively were juniors Trevor Goehring and Cody Skene, sophomore Ryan Wiese and freshman Tommy Evans.

While the offense was stellar, the team's defense set them apart.

Leading the Eagles' defense was senior Cory Whelan, who forced 108 turnovers, picked up 69 ground balls and blocked 26 shots on goal.

Also playing well defensively were juniors Matt Caspari, Eric Albers and Joey Carpenter, as well as senior Chandler Larsen, sophomore Kevin Marshall and freshman Hayden Chisholm.

While the Eagles didn't have much trouble on offense or defense, finding teams to compete against wasn't an easy task.

"The toughest thing about our first year in CIF was our schedule," White said. "We don't belong to a league yet, so we have to travel pretty far to play games, and when we play our games, it's against some of the toughest teams around.

"We played the No. 1 team in San Diego (La Costa Canyon), the No. 1 team in L.A. (Palos Verdes) and the No. 1 team in Ventura (Cate), just to name a few."

Phillips said he didn't mind playing the tough competition.

"It's a blast," Phillips said. "I'd rather play up than down. I got sick of playing the same teams over and over again for years, so this was something real exciting."