BRUNSWICK

The saying goes, it is tough to beat a team a third time in one season.

Don’t tell that to the Brunswick High School boys lacrosse team. The Dragons had two close encounters with Messalonskee during the regular season, including a contest Brunswick trailed during the second half before rallying for a 17-13 victory.

In Wednesday’s Eastern A Regional final, the Dragons scored at will, dominating every facet of the game en route to 21-4 whitewash over the second-seeded Eagles.

Brunswick punched its ticket to Saturday morning’s State Class A final (10 a.m.) at Fitzpatrick Stadium in Portland and will face South Portland in a rematch of last season’s championship, won by the Red Riots. South Portland (13-1) rolled to a 12-4 victory over Thornton Academy in the Western A Regional final on Wednesday.

As has become the custom this season for the senior-laden Dragons, a different player, or players, stepped up. On Wednesday, it was TJ Sullivan’s turn, with the senior attackman scoring a whopping seven goals and adding an assist.

“Everybody is doing their job and working hard, and today I was just hoping, and they got the ball and I was able to put it away,” said Sullivan.

“We knew that we needed to come out firing and put the ball into the back of the net,” said Brunswick’s Ryan Croatti, who had four goals.

Messalonskee never seemed to settle in. Arriving 15 minutes late, which forced the start of the game to be delayed, the Eagles were behind 5- 0 in the opening five minutes and trailed 6-1 after a quarter, their only goal coming from Dylan Jones.

“We didn’t play solid defensively, and it was probably our worst game of the year at the worst possible time,” said Messalonskee (10-5) coach Tom Sheridan. “Brunswick is going to be very tough to beat in the state game. They played well in every facet of the game.”

Transition game

The Dragons put the game away in the second quarter, putting eight shots behind Messalonskee goaltender Elija Tuell, who had 14 saves, including nine in the first half.

After losing his first two faceoffs, midfielder Ian Schlosser won the next 10 as Brunswick darted out to a 14-2 lead in the first half. In all, Schlosser won 19-of-24 faceoffs.

Brunswick was also deadly in transition. Matt Brooks, who dished out six assists, led the attack, along with Cam Glover, who picked up three goals and assisted on three others.

“We love the transition game,” said Brunswick coach Don Glover. “When you don’t take the faceoffs and lose the ground ball battle, you are in trouble. Once we got settled in and started possessing ground balls and faceoffs, we were able to take control.”

Schlosser won nine of 10 faceoffs in the second quarter, with Kyle Woodruff, Brooks and Owen Ginty scoring a goal each 1:26 apart for a 9- 1 Dragons lead. Sullivan scored three straight after Messalonskee’s Connor Smith drew the Eagles to 9-2, giving Brunswick a 12-2 edge. Croatti and Cam Glover added a goal each in the final two minutes of the half for a 12-goal Dragons lead at the break.

Coach Glover was glad to see his team come out strong, especially with his team’s history against normally tough Messalonskee.

“We have always been nip and tuck with Messalonskee, and the last time they played here we were losing and we didn’t play our finest lacrosse,” said the Brunswick coach. “Our focus was to play our lacrosse and to play error-free. When we go out and just play, we do well.”

With the lead 12 goals, Brunswick put the Eagles away with a 5-0 scoring advantage in the third quarter for a 19-2 edge. Sullivan added three more goals, with Cam Glover and Croatti picking up one each. Brunswick’s defense of Kenan Van Vranken, Jon Snell and Ezra Rogers were tough, holding Messalonskee without a shot in the third.

Fourth-quarter goals by Tyler Hillis and Croatti upped the Dragons lead to 21-2 before Smith scored two times to close out the scoring.

Mitchell Smith had three saves for Brunswick. Christian

Glover and Cole Hillis added one goal each for the Dragons, while Eric Kousky picked up an assist.