Dover opens up with dominant win

DURHAM – As one of the preseason favorites in Division II, the Dover High School boys lacrosse team lived up to the advance billing Tuesday night.

The Green Wave scored on their first two possessions and rode the fast start to a 19-6 win over Oyster River in the opener for both clubs.

Dover featured a balanced attack with eight players scoring at least one goal and 10 with at least one point. Dominic Silverio led the offensive barrage with five goals and three assists.

Justin Colizzi had three goals and three assists and Cam Lent added three goals and two assists. Lent’s bounty included a buzzer-beater to end the third quarter that made it 16-5.

“I think we came out with a lot of poise in the offensive end,” said Dover coach John Silverio. “We were really sharing the ball. We try to run multiple offensive sets, and what was nice is our guys are looking to the player that has the best shot on the field. Most of those goals were assisted which is always a great sign.”

Lent was a demon on faceoffs, particularly in the first half when Dover dug the Bobcats a big early hole.

Andrew Housley had two goals and an assist, and Luke Geppert had a hat trick with three straight goals for Dover in the fourth quarter. Kyle Ferriero, Michael Fraser and Ryan Long also scored for the Green Wave, who finished 17-1 last year and reached the semifinals of the D-II tournament.

Goalie Noah Schwartz stopped seven of the nine shots he faced in the first half before being replaced by Seb Cook in the third quarter. Schwartz came up with a couple of big saves after Dover had taken a 2-0 lead just 2:13 into the game.

“I think it’s important to set the pace early so you can get a step on them and see where it goes from there,” Housley said. “It’s good to set the pace early rather than later.”

The only negative for the Green Wave was watching teammate Sean Gallipo limp off the field late in the first half. The junior attackman, who assisted on two of the game’s first four goals, missed much of last season with a knee injury that required surgery.

“It’s heartbreaking because you see how hard he worked in the offseason to get back to this point,” John Silverio said. “He looked great in the preseason. He does a great job. I don’t know what to say. I’m so bummed for him. Hopefully it’s not serious. Maybe he just tweaked it, I hope.”

Gallipo, who played with a brace in his first game back, was favoring his right leg as he came off the field Tuesday night and did not return.

“That was tough to see, knowing what happened last year with his ACL injury,” Housley said. “Hopefully it’s nothing major and we can get him back.”

Max Litchfield had three goals and an assist for Oyster River (0-1), which also received goals from Hayden Marshall, Sam Davies and Will Cilia.

Dover broke the game open early with a three-goal flurry in less than a minute and gave the Green Wave a 6-0 cushion midway through the first quarter.

“We came out really slow,” said Oyster River first-year coach Ruppy Hainey. “We knew what Dover was bringing. It’s no secret around the state with the talent they have. After the year they had last year we knew they were going to be tough. They caught us sleeping a couple times. Our second slide wasn’t there early on and they took good advantage of that.”

Silverio and Colizzi each had two goals and an assist in the first quarter, which ended with Dover on top, 7-0. Colizzi set up Lent to make it 8-0 with 4:14 left in the first half.

Litchfield’s first goal put the Bobcats on the board with 2:44 remaining until halftime. Litchfield set up Marshall 1:17 later to make it 8-2, but the Green Wave scored the last goal of the first half and the first three of the third quarter to extend the margin.

“We started to take our foot off the gas a little bit in that first half and we got out of sync,” John Silverio said, “but we’ve got enough solid players that kind of took over and started the momentum back up again. So I think what you saw is a team that had a little slump, but had the skilled players to get us back out of it.”