The Carmel High School boys lacrosse team kept its eye on the state’s top prize all season
“We all knew going into this season the type of talent we had on the team,” Greyhounds coach Jack Meachum said. “If it wasn’t spoken at every meeting, we all knew what we were working toward. We played a really competitive schedule to get us ready for the end of the season stretch and it paid off. We were ready for this moment.”
Carmel edged Hamilton Southeastern 9-7 June 3 in the Indiana High School Lacrosse Association Class 2A state final at Roncalli High School. It was the Greyhounds’ first state title since 2015. It was Carmel’s fifth state title and first in Class 2A, which started in 2021.
It was much closer than an earlier meeting when host Carmel won 11-4, marking the first time the senior class had beaten the Royals.
“They were ready to play,” said Meachum, who just completed his sixth season as coach. “They ran a zone and made some adjustments. We made some adjustments. After the third quarter, we were trailing. The guys stayed confident, stayed the course and found the way to win.”
Rallying from a 6-5 deficit, Sophomore Brock Rose gave Carmel the lead for good at 7-6.
“We got down by one and we had been in situations like this, and we knew what the goal was,” Meachum said.
Junior Jackson Weaver scored twice for CHS.
Senior midfielder Kyle Fedorcha , who was named IHSLA Player of the Year for the second consecutive season, had a goal. Fedorcha will play lacrosse at Bryant University. Other players going on to play NCAA Division i are Mason Bardwell (University of Vermont) and Quinn Huber (Canisus College).
“We only had six seniors, but all six guys were pretty big contributors for us,” Meachum said. “But we had a good array of seniors, juniors, sophomores and a couple of freshmen getting in the mix. It was a really tight-knit group. The kids bought in from Day 1 and worked really hard for us. A lot of the kids have been working for this since they were 8 years old. It was pretty cool.”
Fedorcha had a team-high 60 goals and 27 assists. Junior Leo Prosser had 42 goals and 25 assists. Huber contributed 28 goals and senior Leo Hammons tallied 24 goals.
