“As the boys’ lacrosse team bus returned to the ferry dock following Saturday’s shocking 16-15 loss to Mercer Island in the state title match at the Islanders’ home field, one of the players threw himself off the pier.But his motivation was greed, not grief.The player stood happily in a puddle of water, clutching a wad of money from doubting teammates who had quickly rebounded emotionally from their keen disappointment at losing the championship game for the first time in eight years.Bainbridge had quickly jumped out to an early lead, scoring twice in the game’s second minute on goals by Jacob Hayashi and Erik Steinecker. But Mercer Island retaliated with three goals in less than a minute and a half and tacked on two more later to take a 5-2 first quarter lead. That equaled the largest deficit Bainbridge had faced all year. And it got worse – much worse – in the second quarter. In the first minute, Bainbridge stopped a Mercer Island scoring thrust but the defender, heavily checked, flipped a pass toward goalie Charlie Delius. An Islander intercepted – a cherry pick – and scored an easy goal. The score ballooned to 9-2 more than seven minutes into the quarter before Bainbridge even had a shot on the Mercer Island goal. It wasn’t close.Two minutes later, Bainbridge was down a man on a penalty. The team appeared to successfully kill the penalty, but just as the penalized player ran back onto the field the Islanders put the ball into the net for a 10-2 lead.Bainbridge finally ended the string of 10 unanswered goals and 21-minute scoring drought at 1:20 on Sam Cameron’s goal on a pass from Jesse Savage. Savage scored again nine seconds later after controlling the draw and running through the Islander defense to make the halftime score a slightly less disheartening 10-4.The mini-momentum of those two goals began turning toward the maxi side as the second half opened. Jesse Fairbank controlled the draw and scored in 15 seconds. A minute and a half later, Adam Smith scored on a jump shot after taking a pass from Spencer Evans to narrow the margin to 10-6. But the Islanders quickly restored the six-point differential, scoring two goals less than 30 seconds apart. Fairbank was virtually unstoppable as he scored five more times in the quarter, which ended with Bainbridge down by just three goals, 14-11.What could have been a major turning point came at 9:48 in the final quarter as the Mercer Island goalie carried the ball nearly halfway to the center line after a save. Steinecker leveled the hapless Islander with an ESPN-highlight-quality hit and the ball bounced loose. Hayashi scooped it up and fired into the open net to reduce the deficit to two. But two minutes later the Islanders went the length of the field after intercepting a pass to restore the three-goal edge. Another Mercer Island goal following a takeaway with less than six minutes left extended their margin to 16-12.Hayashi rebounded a missed shot 30 seconds later, but the clock wound down to 2:08 before John Moore eluded a double-team situation and fed Fairbank for his seventh goal to make the score 16-14. Twenty seconds later, the Mercer Island goalie smothered a Bainbridge shot just six inches from the goal.Mercer Island began milking the clock, but a Peter Bonoff steal led to Fairbank’s eighth goal with 37 seconds remaining as Bainbridge pulled – finally – to within a single goal. Following the draw, yet another in what seemed an interminable series of illegal procedure penalties gave the ball to Mercer Island. Bainbridge forced a turnover with ten seconds remaining but couldn’t get off a shot. The ball dropped to the ground 15 yards away from the goal as the final horn sounded and the jubilant Islanders swarmed onto the field.Mercer Island coach Jack Visco explained that We had already played Bainbridge close twice this year, so our guys were ready.It was a strange game, Bainbridge coach Ryan Painter said. We seemed to have forgotten how well Mercer Island moves the ball. Then when we got down, there may have been some emotions avalanching, and panic beginning to set in. People forgot where they should be, and what their roles were.But credit Mercer island. They capitalized on their opportunities in close.He attributed the second half turnaround to several factors.We played our third line, and that began to tire out their mids, he said. A lot of Jesse’s goals came because he beat a fatigued defenseman and shot before they could double-team him.And this team never says quit. That winning tradition means a lot to them.Painter foresees another strong team – this was their only loss in 16 games – next year.Our young talent picked up a lot of experience this year, which was sort of a rebuilding year. We’ll have a lot of depth next time. “