Rush roll on to NLL semifinals against Halifax

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Rush 13, Swarm 9

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The Saskatchewan Rush had the Georgia Swarm on the run Saturday and the visiting Swarm — try as they might — couldn’t quite catch the host squad.

As a result, Saskatchewan is now moving on to the National Lacrosse League semi-finals thanks to a 13-9 win on Co-op Field at SaskTel Centre.

“We knew they were going to run — that’s our game, too, running — so we took that personal and made sure we were fast and I think they kind of tired out as the game went on,” said Rush star transition player Jake Boudreau, who led all scorers Saturday with four goals.

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“You could kind of see us pushing forward and they kind of dosed off a little bit and that was basically the game.”

Returning to the playoffs for the first time since 2019, the Rush repelled a second-half comeback attempt by the Swarm to hang on to victory during their single elimination quarter-final playoff.

”We had a little bit of a slow start,” admitted Rush general manager and co-coach Derek Keenan, whose team finished second during the regular season with a 13-5 record while Georgia placed seventh at 9-9. “But I actually thought we were getting some pretty good looks on offence and their goalie made a couple of saves. Then we got going and got our legs underneath us.

“In these one-and-done first round of the playoffs are stressful. We’ve got a pretty young group. Fortunately we have a number of veterans who have been here before, but, for the most part, we probably have more than two-thirds of our team who have never been here in the playoffs and these stressful situations so it took us a little while to get our legs underneath us and we got going.”

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Along with Boudreau’s offensive output, the Rush got two goals and two assists from Austin Shanks, while Ryan Keenan and Clark Walter each had two goals and one assist. Zach Manns chipped in with a goal and assist, while Mike Messenger and Jake Naso also scored one goal apiece.

Jordan McIntosh led Georgia with two goals and two assists. Brendan Bomberry and Bryan Cole added two goals and one assist each. Lyle Thompson, Jacob Hickey and Shayne Jackson also scored for Georgia, which led 2-0 early but trailed 4-2 after the first quarter, 6-3 at half-time and 8-6 after three quarters.

Saskatchewan outshot Georgia 59-47.

“It’s an exciting week,” said Rush goalie Frank Scigliano, who stopped 38 of 47 shots Saturday. “You kind of prepare for this all year. The regular season kind of flew by. We had a lot of success (but) in a single elimination game, anything can happen so there was a lot on the line. We played a pretty complete game, for the most part. There were a couple of hiccups, but I thought we did our job tonight. You see the results on the scoreboard.”

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After giving up a pair of early ones, Scigliano was outstanding in the Rush net and made some spectacular saves, including an acrobatic one with his goal-stick.

Brett Dobson made 46 saves for the Swarm, who gave up a pair of empty-net goals in the final minute.

Saskatchewan now plays the Halifax Thunderbirds in a best-of-three NLL semifinal playoff series. The first game will be played next weekend in Halifax, N.S., with the series returning to Saskatoon for Game 2 and, if necessary, Game 3 to be played May 10-11 at SaskTel Centre.

The other NLL best-of-three semifinal will see the Buffalo Bandits play the Vancouver Warriors.

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