A Spirited Effort Leads to Road Win for BLC

By Mark Stehlin

Two days, two wins, a great recipe for future success for the Brooklin Lacrosse Club (BLC) on this young season.

BLC returned to the Peterborough Memorial Centre last night for the first time since a controversial game seven semi-final loss to the Lakers in 2025. It was an equipment challenge and ensuing penalty that that led to BLC getting knocked out of the playoffs. Last night they were able to exorcise those demons with a solid 12-10 win to go 3-2 on the season. Equally impressive was the fact that less than 24 hours prior they dispatched the Brampton Excelsiors 12-5 in a home game. 

In opposing nets for this contest were two members of the National Lacrosse League champion Toronto Rock.  Nick Rose took his spot for Peterborough and for BLC it was Steve Orleman.

Will MacLeod with his first of three on the night opened the scoring as he drifted out from the right side and fired one past Rose. With just over a minute left in that period, veteran Dan Lintner coming off a three-goal performance in Wednesday’s win over Brampton, scored while all alone in front of Rose to make it 3-2 for the visitors. Mike Hasen on the Lakers bench called a time out in the dying seconds, but his team were unable to execute the play that was drawn up and BLC had the lead after one.

- photo c/o Dean Link 

In the face-off circle all night, BLC rookie and Ohio State University (OSU) Senior, Jack Oldman was up against arguably one of the best face-off specialists OSU alumni Jake Withers on the other side.

“It felt great out there tonight, I kind of followed in Withers’ footsteps and he coached me for a long time, so it was fun to be out there and play against him tonight,” said Oldman after the game.

“All in all, it was fun to battle against a guy I looked up to growing up and I think I was able to compete with him,” added Oldman.

The Lakers had a very early power play and gave the announced crowd of 2,492 partisan fans a reason to cheer, they were unable to convert on the extra man situation. The Lakers did, however, manage to score the first two goals of the middle frame. It was Taggart Clark who responded for BLC. With  tenacious play he was able to corral the loose ball deep in the Lakers end and deposit one behind Rose. Jakson Raposo, with his first of the season, followed Clark with a goal for BLC and after two periods BLC held on to the 6-5 lead.

The visitors were assessed another very early penalty, this one with just 15 seconds off the clock. Their hosts converted to knot the score at 6-6 setting up a great run to the finish. The teams did not disappoint and played an exciting brand of lacrosse the rest of the way. In that final period, BLC took the upper hand and were able to maintain the lead even after the Lakers scored. While the Lakers kept coming the visitors were able to withstand the onslaught en route to a 12-10 win.

“We talked to the guys before the game about finding a way to measure ourselves against other teams, we have a few games under our belt some we were happy with and some not,” said head coach Joel Johnson.

“I thought tonight was a good test, this is a tough building to play in and they are a good team over there who will punish you when you make mistakes. We had an excuse to slow down having played last night. I though the guys responded well all game and our body language showed that tonight. Our guys ran for all three periods and I think that was the difference in the game,” added Johnson.

Scoring – Lintner (1,2) MacLeod (3,3) Clark (2,1) Sinfield (1,2) Raposo (1,0) Scanlan (2,4) Barnable (1,2) Kearnan (1,1)

Next up is a road trip to Cobourg on Sunday at 6 pm for a date with the Kodiaks who beat BLC 10-8 on May 27 at their home opener.