The Okotoks Junior A Raiders top goal scorer from a year ago showed no signs of a sophomore slump in the Rocky Mountain Lacrosse League season opener.
Raiders transition player Holden Cattoni registered seven goals and nine points to lead Okotoks past the St. Albert Miners 13-9 in the Rocky Mountain Lacrosse League (RMLL) regular season debut, May 12 at Okotoks Centennial Arena.
“It was an exciting game, it was good to get back into the swing of things,” Cattoni said. “It felt awkward at first, I had butterflies coming into the rink which I usually don’t get because it felt like I hadn’t done it in a while.”
Those nerves were not evident on the Centennial Arena floor as Cattoni looked every bit one of the top snipers in the province. Cattoni finished second in the RMLL with 35 goals in his rookie season at the Junior A level in 2011.
“You always have to have confidence when you play, in the second period they just weren’t dropping for me and in the third I just buckled down,” Cattoni said. “You can’t change the way you play if the ball doesn’t drop, you have to keep pushing.”
Cattoni used his lacrosse IQ to find seam after seam in the Miners’ defence with four goals in the first period capped off with a third-period hat-trick.
Raiders head coach Daryl Haynes, in his first regular season game behind the bench since taking over the reins from former coach Bruce Codd, was singing the praises of the sophomore phenom following the match.
“His lacrosse sense is very, very high at least as high if not higher than just about anybody I’ve ever coached,” Haynes said of Cattoni who was given the game ball. “He sees the floor well, he sees what his man’s doing and he understands what the defence is going to do.”
The DeWinton native wasn’t alone in filling the net for the Raiders. Leighton Gibson tallied two goals and three assists while Aaron Tackaberry registered four points highlighted by an outrageous behind-the-back goal in the first period before leaving the game with an injury in the middle frame.
“We asked a lot of all of our players, we had some guys go down,” Haynes said. “Cattoni really helped with the scoring, but on the back side he played well, the Gibsons (brothers Marshall and Leighton), Cam (Copland) and Brett (Baron) played really well.”
Haynes was impressed with the totality of the effort by the Raiders, save for a few spells of inconsistency.
“Our transition game was for the most part really good, our forward transition,” Haynes said. “We’ll have to work on our defensive transition.”
The Raiders were also victimized on three of 11 shorthanded situations, allowing St. Albert to claw back into the game in the second period.
“We’re going to have to change up a little bit, they’re a shooting powerplay and our men down low are designed to take the corners away and basically play a three-on-two across the side and we’ll have to adjust a bit.”
The teams carried a 9-9 tie into the third period before Okotoks’ caged warrior took over. Raiders goalie Ryan McBride didn’t have to steal the game for Okotoks, but made big saves in the last two periods including a crucial stop on a clear-cut breakaway from St. Albert’s Spencer Gelinas with less than five minutes on the clock.
“Ryan McBride played unbelievable in the third, he shut them down, they had three or four powerplays back-to-back and he played phenomenal in the third,” Cattoni said. “He was the reason we came back in the game.”
Cattoni said the Raiders were a tad bit rusty and can certainly improve on the performance.
“We, as a team, were far from where we want to be,” Cattoni said. “We’re young in the dressing room and our leaders really stepped up for us in the second period and we played way better in the third.”
One of the young Raiders included 16-year-old Okotokian Bret Davis who was making his Junior A debut after being drafted by his hometown club in February.
“I was pretty nervous before the game because I was coming back to my hometown and it was my first game of Junior A,” Davis said. “It took me a couple periods to get into it, in the third I felt a lot better.”
The 16-year-old’s anxiety didn’t hamper his performance as Davis was given plenty of floor time and responsibility including service on the penalty kill.
“It’s a lot faster than the Junior B game where I’ve been playing so far this year,” said Davis, who was plying his trade with the Tier I Calgary Shamrocks. “It was good to be with the boys and it was a good, strong game.”
The physicality was also a new experience for Davis.
“The Junior A defence guys know how to play you a lot better so in that way it’s a lot rougher.”
Davis and the Raiders return to Centennial Arena floor tonight, May 16, for a face off with the Calgary Jr. Mountaineers at 8 p.m. For more information on the Raiders go to www.raiderslacrosse.com
