Interdistrict rivals battle in charity classic
Valley comes out victorious in first annual game for charity
Pascack Valley’s boys lacrosse team in a pregame huddle before the team’s first annual charity classic against rival Pascack Hills. The players are all wearing orange “Lax 4 Zack” stickers on their helmets.
Last week, for just the the third time in head boys lacrosse coach Craig Buckley’s seven year tenure at Pascack Valley, the Indians faced off against the Cowboys of rival Pascack Hills. And while the Indians came out on top 15-7, the game was about more than just moving to 3-0 on the season.
The two schools played the game with the goal of raising and donating money to the Zack Latteri Scholarship Fund. Latteri, a former PV student, passed away from leukemia last July, and many teams have held similar fundraisers. In the end, the game raised nearly $1,400 for the cause.
Going forward, the two schools will look to make this charity game into a yearly tradition. Buckley said each subsequent year the schools will choose a different foundation to raise money for.
The decision to play Hills for this purpose was met with near universal support from the players, with little care given to the result of the game.
“We felt it was something we needed to do,” said Pascack Valley captain Joe Williams. “It really hit home for a lot of us.”
“We [really] were playing for [Latteri],” said junior Conor Kimball who added four goals in the win. “We weren’t playing for the win.”
Though they weren’t playing for the win, Pascack Valley held nothing back and scored at will. The Indians were tied with Pascack Hills with 2 goals apiece at the end of the first quarter, the only time this season that has happened. However, they responded with nine unanswered goals, and would ultimately outscore Hills 13-5 for the remainder of the game.
Valley’s offensive onslaught was led by Jimmy Spillane who contributed five goals. Spillane like his teammates, was quick to laud the decision to schedule the game, and also didn’t give much thought to the result.
“At first I was wondering why we would play Hills, but then I heard about what it was really for and really liked the idea,” Spillane said.
Spillane, who has largely been the driver of PV’s potent offense that is scoring nearly 13 goals per game, noted that the score of the game didn’t matter, nor did his personal accolades.
“We raised over $1,400 for Zack Latteri, that number is more important than any number on the scoreboard,” Spillane said.
