CAPE ELIZABETH – No. 2 Cape Elizabeth tuned up for its annual trip to the Western Class B boys’ lacrosse championship game Saturday by running away with a 15-3 victory against No 3 Greely at Hannaford Field.

“We just ran into a machine up here,” Greely Coach Teddy Rausch said. “We really wanted to run with them, but it’s Cape.”

The Capers (11-2) will play at top-seeded Falmouth (12-1) on Wednesday for the regional title. It’s their sixth consecutive trip to the regional final.

The Rangers (8-5) hung with Cape for the first 16 minutes.

“Three offside penalties just killed us, and, once the avalanche gets going, it’s kind of hard to stop,” Rausch said. “But we gave them a run for the first 15, 16 minutes.”

Greely pulled within three goals of the lead before the Capers ran off three goals during the final four minutes of the first half to open an 8-2 lead.

“At the beginning of the game, we were trying to push the ball out in transition, and we dropped a lot of passes,” said Cape Elizabeth attackman Wilson Laprade, who had two assists.

The Capers (11-2) committed 15 of their 24 turnovers during the first half.

“Once we got it down and starting settling it against their zone, we could make one dodge, pass the ball around a couple of times and we could always find an open man,” Laprade said.

“We definitely settled down a little bit after the first quarter or so,” Raymond said. “We moved the ball better and possessed a little bit more on our offense. At the beginning of the game, we were all in a little hurry.”

The game was played in a steady drizzle, but Cape Elizabeth Coach Ben Raymond said the wet conditions weren’t the reason for Cape’s sloppy play early on.

“The conditions were perfect today,” he said. “It was us trying to make the extra pass, the perfect pass or the 40-yard pass to get a fast break when we don’t always need to get that.”

Teddy Smith, a senior attackman, led the Capers with five goals, all on hard shots from about 15 yards. Tim Takach, a senior middie, scored three goals. Tim Lavallee, another senior middie, added two. Casey O’Donovan, Alex Diaz, Ned Melanson, Tom Bottomley and Justin Cary each added a goal.

For Greely, Austin Spencer scored two goals. Matt Ricker scored once and Paul Witte had an assist.

Staff Writer Paul Betit can be contacted at 791-6424 or at:

pbetit@pressherald.com

Twitter: PaulBetitPPH