2025 Season: Boys Varsity Summary

2025 Varsity Lacrosse:

We ended up 9-7 on the season; two games were canceled (Holy Trinity, due to weather conditions & Belen Jesuit, due to a serious accident at their school ) during the season, as well as our Preseason Jamboree at Oxbridge Academy by Oxbridge for some unknown reason.

Our Captains:  Seniors Beckley Waldrop, Bobby Campbell and Keegan Nymanand Connor O'Brien

2025 Pirate Awards:

    MVP:         Connor O'Brien (Navy Commit)

    MVSP:       Keegan Nyman (Army Commit)

    Seniors:     3D Award (Desire, Dedication, Determination):  Beckley Waldrop (Denison University Walk-on).   Junior:       3D Award (Desire, Dedication, Determination): Connor O'Brien

    Soph:         3D Award (Desire, Dedication, Determination): Behrgan Nyman.   Freshman: 3D Award (Desire, Dedication, Determination): Chris Campbell, Syrus Cooper 

.                        

    8th grade:  3D Award (Desire, Dedication, Determination): Turner Barnett 

2025 US Lacrosse Florida South All-Star Team

Attack-     Connor O'Brien

Defense-  Beckley Waldrop, Behr Nyman

2025 US Lacrosse Florida South Academic All-America

Connor OBrien

Season Review:

Statistics:

Players of the Game(s):

We slowly became a decent top 20 team in Class 1A from January 20 through March 29.   After our victory against Oxbridge Academy here at Saint Edward's on March 29, we struggled to play complementary lacrosse, and I believe we dropped from a ranking of 10th in Class 1A to 17th overall ranking, and from 14th to 32nd overall in Florida (combined 1A/2A).   

Notable notes: 

After refining our play in the early part of the season, we began to settle into an offense that seemed to fit us and a defense that was causing some problems for other teams.  

Coming off a dominate win vs. Cardinal Gibbons on Fri March 7,  the team ventured into Spring Break and practiced on the Saturday prior to our Mon March 17 game against St. Mark's from Dallas Texas here at Saint Edward's (BTW, St. Marks just won the 2025 Class A Championship! in Texas!).  St. Mark's beat up on Vero Beach (12 to 3) two days before playing us, and well to everyone's surprise, we totally surprised them winning 6-5!  We had a great first half against St. Mark's, but then struggled in the second half, but we held on for victory.  Then we traveled to Gulliver Prep on that Friday, where we played really well for three quarters and probably had our best overall game of the season.  

At Gulliver Prep we had a fantastic game utilizing good fundamentals, playing complimentary lacrosse and we were solid up the field in the middle... ie, an offense with Connor O'Brien being healthy and dominating matchups, Keegan Nyman playing make it- take it on face-offs and getting a few important goals himself, our Defense playing solid against an athletic Gulliver offense (Beckley Waldrop, Behr Nyman, Bobby Campbell and Mark Moore keeping Gulliver at distance, and Edwin Provancher making saves at a rate of 50%  

After this, we had a crazy week of cancelled games (Holy Trinity,  Belen Jesuit) and then played Oxbridge Academy.  We played well and beat them.  We had a good game, but much of that had to do with Keegan Nyman controlling the face-offs and Connor O'Brien being unstoppable!

After our Oxbridge Academy victory, the Vero Beach prom that weekend, and whatever, we became our opponent's best player in many respects.  We couldn't muster, sustain, or finish anything that looked comparable to the two-week stretch after Spring Break.  We did have an injury bug with three of our top four players, plus Keegan came down with illness while still fighting the injury bug.  Needless to say, this 2025 season, we didn't function very well when Keegan wasn't physically healthy or struggled to take some reps on offense.  

In our annual rivalry game with Vero Beach, we just struggled to keep Vero Beach off the board.  Keegan was sick with strep and had a pulled hamstring; we just couldn't control the middle of the field, including face-offs.  Connor was having knee issues, and it wasn't his best shooting night, and of course, we relied on Connor too much out of necessity, which means "way too much!"  Vero Beach just wanted the game more, with their overall hustle and execution, and their coaching staff did a great job of attacking our weaknesses with their best athletes.  Their goalie, Josh Thomas, made some nice saves on us to build their confidence to help create some momentum and keep it in the second half of play, which they dominated..

CSN-  Beckley was out with a hamstring pull.  Keegan was still sick and had a hamstring pull, Connor was still limping around with knee problems, we turned the ball over on offense repeatedly in the middle of the field, and we could not keep the ball out of the back of our net!.  This was an ugly game.

District semi-final vs Jensen Beach-  We seem to have their number.  They really don't ever play well against us, even though they play some of their opponents very closely.  But we had their number, played well, and took advantage of their weaknesses...probably best said our strengths on the field are where they are weak, and our strengths dominated those match-ups.  Keegan was healthy, and it certainly made a difference, too.

District Final vs Benjamin-  Benjamin is way out of our league in terms of varsity lacrosse.  I can't say we played badly, but nowhere on the field do we out-athlete them, or for that matter, out-lacrosse skill them.  This was a total beatdown on Saint Edward's, and to make things worse, we were still struggling to keep the ball out of our net. Keegan did a great job at the face-off, but Benjamin relied on their athleticism, shutting off his outlets and allowing their face-off guy to keep him from getting a good pass off.  So, as you heard me state before, we did not control the middle of the field against them, and it led to a less-than-good result.  And not to mention, Benjamin just won the State Championship over Saint Andrew's.

Regional Quarterfinal vs LHP- We had a great week of practice.  I thought we would perform better.  However, LHP did a good job of nullifying Connor (keeping him under 4 goals/points) and making our other younger or less experienced players beat them.  Keegan did well early on, but struggled in the second half, with the one-on-one battles at the FO becoming tougher.  We, again, struggled to keep the ball out of our net. 

Florida Class 1A Final Rankings:   Overall Ranking in Florida (Including 1A and 2A teams):Some neat successes along the way:

The Rojas brothers (Cesar, Sophomore, and Alex, Freshman) were certainly in the role of being a project when they first came out for lacrosse.  They honestly made lacrosse a project for themselves, and I'm so proud of the incredible effort and strides they made in their game!  I pray they keep at it, and I will truly look forward to their contribution to our team next year!

David Vasquez, Jr. is a great teammate and is always here and helping his teammates every step of the way in practice and in games when he is called upon!

The 2024 JV roster of 7th/8th/9th/10th graders helped create a path forward for boys' varsity lacrosse this past season.  Notable impactful players like Brady McCoy,Chris Campbell, Syrus Cooper, and Turner Barnett made a splash each and every game as young guns on the field of gameplay, while Merrit Kennedy, Dylan Colontrelle, Bobby Varrichio, Hugh Cochrane, Daniel Clemente and Rex Herrman made great strides in practices and limited varsity game action, and hopefully will be ready to make an impact in their next lacrosse season and in following years!  

Hopefully, Cooper Porter, Braxton Adams and Spencer Davis will work toward their next level to help give their team a boost in 2026!

Senior Day Memories:

Bobby Campbell's Family!  

Keegan Nyman's Family:

Beckley Waldrop's Family:

The Lax Family!

Later Alligators:

Behr Nyman leaves Saint Edward's for Lawrenceville Academy, and Alex Dambournet is headed to Ransome Everglades for the 2025-2026 school year.  You will be missed!