Miles Fisher saw a prime opportunity to score and knew what to do with it. Soon after, he was buried amid an avalanche of teammates in celebration.
Fisher’s goal with 3 minutes, 35 seconds left in sudden-death, double overtime lifted the Wildcats to a 8-7 win over Menlo-Atherton on April 21 in a matchup that essentially decided the Santa Clara Valley Athletic League championship.
Fisher got the ball near the left hash mark, about 25 yards from the goal. He made one move and with nary a defender around, stepped up and rifled a shot that the M-A goalie had little chance of stopping.
“I was just waiting for that matchup the entire game,” Fisher said. “I went in and they didn’t switch. I saw the goal and went for it, and I knew it was going in.”
The Wildcats improved to 8-0 in league play with four contests left: against Mountain View, Burlingame, Palo Alto and Los Altos. In the first round of league play, they beat those four squads by a combined score of 72-13.
Barring a spate of unforeseen circumstances, Los Gatos should finish a perfect 12-0 in SCVAL play. Had the Wildcats lost to Menlo-Atherton, the two teams would’ve likely tied for the title. However, Los Gatos swept the season series, beating M-A 10-7 on March 17.
The rematch proved to be a much tougher task for the Wildcats, who trailed for most of the way until they took a 6-5 lead with 34 seconds left in the third quarter on a nifty shot from Chase Hooper off an assist from Connor Black.
That was the third of three Los Gatos goals in a third period that saw the Wildcats turn the tide of the match. M-A was held scoreless in the period as Los Gatos turned a 5-3 halftime deficit into a 6-5 lead entering the fourth quarter.
However, M-A responded—just like you knew it would—and scored back-to-back goals to retake the lead, 7-6, with 11:03 left in regulation. Los Gatos got the equalizer on Carson Bohn’s third goal of the contest, a shot from 18 yards away that can be likened to a Steph Curry 3-pointer from 10 feet beyond the arc.
Bohn knew scoring from long range was quite a feat, and pretty much stood motionless after the ball went in as to signify his shotmaking prowess. The senior midfielder takes the team’s faceoffs and wins many of them, and has proven to be one of the team’s best players.
Quinn Merritt, who had a tremendous football season last fall, is having a tremendous lacrosse season as well.
“Carson Bohn and Miles Fisher are definitely two of our big energy guys, and Quinn Merritt is another guy we go to when we need a jolt of energy,” Wildcats coach Chris Nespor said. “But all across the board we’ve got great athletes. It’s a lot of fun coaching a good group of guys, and we really are playing some of our best ball right now which is all you can ask for.”
When the Central Coast Section playoffs start on May 11, Los Gatos should get locked in as the No. 4 seed behind powerhouse programs St. Ignatius, Sacred Heart Prep and Bellarmine. SI and SHP are the class of the CCS, with teams like Los Gatos, Bellarmine and Menlo-Atherton below in the next tier.
“With this win, we’ve got the inside track to the four (seed),” Nespor said. “We lost to Bellarmine earlier in the year (7-6 on March 8), so they’re probably getting that three seed. But you got to be happy with that four.”
Nespor was also happy in how his players competed against a very good M-A side. This wasn’t the Wildcats’ most impressive performance of the season, but it was probably their guttiest. Facing a M-A goalie who made a number of stops on shots that would normally score against most teams, the Wildcats had to dig deep.
They were able to do that because they have a sensational goalie of their own in Charlie Scott Bibaud, whose distinctive voice booms as he communicates with his defense when the other team has the ball. Merritt had two goals and Colt Cali scored once for Los Gatos, which saw great defensive plays made from Fisher and Jackson Turpin on M-A’s penultimate possession in regulation to prevent a score.
Whenever Los Gatos had the ball on M-A’s end, Fisher, Turpin, Merritt, Cali, Michael Hoffman and Jack Bond whipped the ball around to find a high-percentage shot. Merritt had one of the best goals of the match when he scored on a wraparound shot to open the third.
Merritt and Jack Baldwin both had shots that clanked off the post in the first sudden-death overtime period. Fisher said the players relish a tough challenge, though it took them a while to get in rhythm against M-A.
“I think going into it everyone was a little nervous because this was one of our closest games so far,” he said. “But we just previously had an overtime game, so I think we’re kind of built for this kind of game, and it showed.”
When Fisher scored the game-winner, he threw his stick—a la the Blue Jays’ Jose Bautista throwing his bat in the 2015 American League Division Series—before being engulfed by his teammates.
“I literally threw my stick as far as I could,” Fisher said. “It was just pure happiness.”
Said Nespor: “Just really proud of our guys for fighting back. We were down early and we were able to keep throwing punches and keep taking punches and then come out on top.”
Sports editor Emanuel Lee can be reached at el**@we*****.com
