Men's Lacrosse: CCBC Essex Takes Aim at National Title

CCBC Essex has hauled in a lot of honors the past few days.

Luke Phipps was named 2011 All Maryland JUCO men's lacrosse offensive player of the year, Neil Willis was named defensive player of the year and Shawn Burke was named coach of the year.

But several of the Knights said this week that individual goals are not the final objective—that comes this weekend when CCBC Essex takes part in the national Final Four in Herkimer, NY.  The Knights advanced to the semifinals after they won the Region XX title Sunday against Howard Community College.

The No. 3-seed Knights open play at 3:30 p.m. Saturday in the semifinals against No. 2 Nassau Community College, a team that beat CCBC Essex, 9-5, in regular-season play in April. The title game is Sunday.

"It is about the team and not individuals," Willis told Patch on Wednesday.

CCBC Essex has won four straight regional titles and 1o of the last 11.

"From team success comes all of those individual awards," Burke said. "We have a pretty mature senior class. They have done a good job of putting the team first. I noticed on Sunday we celebrated as a group after goals and not just one or two guys."

"That does not mean too much to us," Phipps said of individual honors. "That [national title] is now what we are focused on. Winning games—that is our main goal. We have to win smaller battles, and groundballs, just the little things we need to be focused on and be ready."

And what about facing Nassau again?

"I think last time we had not played any good teams yet before facing them. We came out flat. We did not play too well," Willis said.

The Knights (14-2 overall) won, 16-7, in the Region XX title game at home Sunday over Howard Community College, the school Burke coached before coming to Essex.

"I thought we played well. There are always things you want to improve on. It was a solid team effort from us," Burke said.

CCBC Essex plans to leave early Friday morning for the drive to Herkimer, which is near Utica. This will be third year in a row the Final Four will be held there.

"I definitely think it will be a great experience and great opportunity to get a chance to play them," Burke said. "We did not play our best against them the first time around."

"Everyone as a whole did not feel they played their best game," Burke added. "It was a team loss. Since then we have picked things back up in practice. I am excited for the atmosphere of the big games that are ahead of us. I am excited to play a team that beat us earlier in the year."

Eastern Tech graduate Travis Crane, a sophomore, was a student at UMBC last year when the Knights lost in the national title game in Herkimer. Now the transfer, who hopes to play at Maryland next season, is preparing for his first JUCO Final Four.

According to Burke, "Every time you play a good team, you have to play close to your best to win. That is the lesson we learned last time. Some games we have not had to play at the top level to win.

"This time we have a better understanding of that," he said. "I think we are better prepared. They are pretty balanced. They have big, athletic middies. They will hold the ball and wait for you to make mistakes."

Knights named to the All-MD JUCO first team were Eric Biller, Trey Cover, Crane, Dixon Green, Brandon Kendrick, Phipps and Willis. Neil Hutchinson, Christian Leone and Sam Ottey were second-team picks and Luke Horner was honorable mention. Biller, Cover, Crane, Green, Kendrick, Phipps and Willis were first-team All-Region XX picks.

Phipps was Region XX offensive player of the year, Willis was defensive player of the year and Burke was the Region XX coach of the year.

Leading scorers include Phipps (42 goals), Green (33), Leone (25) and Crane (22).

Baseball Falls in Regional Playoffs

The No. 6-seed Knights baseball team beat Rappahannock, 6-1, on Tuesday in the opening round of the Region XX tournament in North East. Essex then lost Tuesday to Cecil, 5-4, and ended the season 24-23 overall.

Nicolas Morton was 7-2 as a pitcher this season for the Knights and Blake Keiger had an ERA of 1.56. Matt Edwards hit .328, Greg Myers hit .321 and catcher David Williams, a graduate of Eastern Tech, hit .293.

This was the first season for the Knights under head coach Michael Carter, who was an assistant coach last year.

Among the players moving on to four-year schools include pitcher Eric Ryan, who plans to play for Division II Lenoir-Rhyne in North Carolina.