Photo by Jacques Morin
For the seventh year in a row, the Orange lacrosse team has won a state playoff game.
Contrast that to the early years of the program, when one official who watched most games said it was a good night when Orange may have lost, but at least kept the margin close enough to avoid a running clock.
In 2019, Orange defeated Northside-Jacksonville 17-13 for head coach Chandler Zirkle’s first postseason win. Now, he’s won 16 playoff games overall after the Panthers defeated Swansboro 18-6 at Auman Stadium in Hillsborough to open the 6A-1A State Playoffs on Thursday night.
Senior Brett Clark and junior Owen Wimsatt each scored five goals as the third-seeded Panthers advanced to face conference rival Carrboro in the 3rd round on Tuesday night in Hillsborough in the round of 16. On Friday, Carrboro inched past Northside-Jacksonville 9-8 at Jaguars Stadium to arrange a third meeting with Orange.
The Panthers prevailed despite playing without its second-leading scorer Jay Parker and top defender Brady PfeiffenbergerIt continues a season-long pattern that started when Orange’s top four scorers missed games against Walter Williams and Millbrook in early March due to injuries.
It’s the most adversity that Zirkle has had as a head coach since his first Orange team in 2018. Zirkle’s razor-sharp memory can detail the departures from eight years ago with the names rolling right off his tongue effortlessly, still fresh from the embryonic stages of his coaching career.
The only difference between then and now is Orange has become an established program.
“A bunch of guys quit right in the middle of that season,” Zirkle said. “That was the only year that was as tough as this one has been. It’s been a series of challenges to overcome and it has us where we are. We still have to play well because we have some challenges coming up.”
Orange (15-5) scored the first nine goals against Swansboro to remove any suspense early. Clark, now the second-leading scorer in program history with over 300 points, factored in on three of the four goals in the opening quarter. Wimsatt notched the opening tally just 1:43 into the game. Clark scored the next two goals, then assisted on a tally by Kaiden Wallace, his second of the season.
Clark completed the hat trick just 36 seconds into the second quarter. Daylon Smalls, Owen Quinn, and Wimsatt would all add goals to put Orange ahead 9-0.
Swansboro (13-9) didn’t get on the board until freshman Jackson Simmons scored with 16 seconds remaining in the first half. The Pirates’ Carter Geddes started the second half with a goal off an assist from Wyatt Peterson.
Orange senior Matthew Macneir scored the first of two goals with 9:11 remaining in the third quarter to put Orange head 10-2. Casey Olson took a pass from Dylan Herndon and deposited the ball into the right corner to increase the Orange lead to 11-2. Geddes added consecutive goals for the Pirates.
Herndon, Macneir and Clark all scored to finish out the third quarter for Orange. Wimsatt scored all three of Orange’s goals in the fourth quarter.
The meeting between Orange and Carrboro will be their third of this season and the sixth since 2024. It will be the fifth straight year they’ve played in the state playoffs.
This time, the Jaguars will be much more confident.
After Orange won the opening meeting at Jaguars Stadium 11-7 on April 7, Carrboro defeated the Panthers 11-10 on May 23 in Hillsborough.
“We played really poorly that day,” Zirkle said. “The practice before the game was our worst practice all year. The gameday was a system failure situation where nothing goes right. Hopefully, we can be motivated by it and play better. We know it’s going to be a challenging game.”
