The story of the week focused on Roald Amundsen, a Norwegian explorer who was the first person to reach the North and South poles.  Amundsen's claim to fame was his victory over Robert Falcon Scott in the race to the South Pole in 1910.  Using skis and sled dogs, Amundsen made it to the pole 35 days ahead of Scott,and more importantly returned alive to tell about it.   Scott and his ponies are still frozen in the Antarctic. 

100 years later St. John's Boys' lacrosse entered a race of their own and on the brink of elimination.  By losing to Episcopal of Houston on 3/23, the Mavs were in a must win situation to be one of the top two teams in the SPC South to advance to the D1 playoffs on 4/16 & 4/17 in Austin.  A loss would drop St. John's to D2 letting the Falcons and Knights take the top tier slots.  In a winner take all SPC marquee match-up, St. John's followed their field leader, Reed Daniel, to victory with lightning looming as a cold front swept through on Scotty Caven Field.

Before the skies could unload any electricity, Caldwell Flores struck the first goal in the game, and then assisted Daniel to give St. John's a 2-0 lead at the end of the quarter.  Kinkaid answered with 2 second quarter goals by Roger Kelsey and George Sealy to tie it up going into the half.  For the first 24 minutes of play St. John's led in the stat sheet on face offs, gb's, and shots, but Kinkaid 's Alex Cooper put up 8 saves and made the Mavericks change course to get to destination D1.

10 Seconds into the third period the Falcons showed why they were on a four game winning streak (3-0 SPC),and took their first lead on a Graham Bailey goal off the face.  Not to be rattled, Daniel kept his troops alive by scoring to tie it at the 8:34 mark, and then found Chris Gow less than a minute later to take back the lead.  

While the offense was working to score, team defense was staking their own claim to the journey.  Midway through the third, on a break by the Mavericks' leading gb man of the game, John Ytterberg (7), Jordan Schuler made the most of the opportunity to put the Mavs up 5-3.  The Falcons, looking for a victory of their own and a claim of the S1 status, got another goal by Bailey assisted by Kelsey with 4:08 in the third to cut it the lead in half.   As the front moved through without a bolt the Maverick long sticks hit again as lsm William Wallace took a clearing pass and put the Mavs up 6-4 going into the 4th quarter.

Co-Captain Daniel rallied his troops to start the fourth quarter.  Leading by example, #16 took it down the gut of the Falcon D to make it 7-4 on a goal just minutes into the final period. Kinkaid's Sealy answered off a break to cut it to 7-5 with 8:07 to go, but Gow got his second score a minute later making it 8-5 until Kinkaid scored with 10 seconds remaining. 

From start to finish the Mavericks showed their determination to dominate on defense and gb's.  Mistakes were made, but more than made up for, with the desire to get to destination D1 ahead of the Falcons and the Knights, and live to tell about it.

The Mavericks face off for the first time against D1 newcomer, Cinco Ranch, Friday night on Caven Field.