West Hempstead boys lacrosse survives 'scary' first-half run by Uniondale

West Hempstead breathed a sigh of relief Saturday when it pulled away from host Uniondale to win, 10-6, in non-league boys lacrosse after a brutal end to the first half in which it gave up four unanswered goals.

“[Uniondale’s run] felt scary,” West Hempstead’s Gavin Lee said. “I think we got a little too comfortable up 6-0 and we just weren’t locked in.”

It appeared the game was over as soon as it started when the Rams got out to a commanding 6-0 lead with four minutes left in the first half and no signs of slowing down while riding the hot hand of Lee, who scored two of his four goals in the opening run.

The momentum shifted, however, when Uniondale (0-6) rallied with four straight goals to end the half down 6-4. Melvin Canales had both of his goals during that run and Yoendy Torres scored one of his two goals for Uniondale.

“We were just allowing them to beat us in transition,” West Hempstead coach Austin Wolfson admitted.

Rams attack David Tobar expected a powerful halftime speech from Wolfson, and that's exactly what they got from their coach.

“[He] fired us up at halftime and said that the first five minutes [of the second half] were going to be the hardest five minutes of the game,” Tobar said. “That’s when we started rolling and turned it up.”

Invigorated by their coach’s impassioned words, the Rams came out in the second half with the same hunger with which they started the game. The Rams and Knights traded a goal, but then the Rams ran off three unanswered goals to end the game.

Wolfson said that at halftime, he emphasized, “Ground balls and finishing plays. They [Uniondale] were outworking us in a lot of areas of the game that you need to win, but we were able to push back a little bit, started winning more ground balls and buried some [goals] when we needed it.”

Tobar scored two goals for West Hempstead (3-3).

“At the end, I think we woke up, pulled through and really played as a team,” Lee said.