It was a battle of speed vs. size during the home opener for the Rockyview Silvertips lacrosse team at the Olds Sports Complex on May 5.
Taking on the Edmonton Warriors, the Silvertips, a team made up of players from communities ranging from Olds to Calgary, had to rely on their agility and swiftness to contend with the taller, brawnier Warriors.
Jordan Erlandson opened up the scoring for the Silvertips with a breakaway at 17:17 in the first period.
But Edmonton scored three unanswered goals in the remainder of the frame to go up 3-1.
The second period did not start much better for Rockyview as Edmonton players proved too powerful for the Silvertips' defence and the Warriors scored four more goals before Erlandson ended the drought for Rockyview with a bouncer that Edmonton netminder John McMillan couldn't get his stick on at 5:21.
Edmonton scored two more goals thanks to Mackenzie Riesterer and Ryan Ewashko before Rockyview seemed to find a second wind and answered with a pair of goals of its own before the end of the second.
The Silvertips sent a message to the Warriors in the third, however, that they wouldn't go away easily.
After Edmonton scored at the beginning of the frame, Rockyview went on a run in the second half of the period, with Erlandson scoring a power-play goal at 9:16.
Edmonton responded at 8:51 with a goal from Brett LaRiviere and then Rockyview's Paulo Falzi scored at 5:04.
Ewashko scored his fifth goal of the game for the Warriors at 1:44 and
Erlandson nailed his fourth in the dying seconds of the game for an 11-8 final.
The Silvertips' Rocky Mountain Lacrosse League companions, the Olds Stingers junior team, split the weekend with a 13-11 win against the Calgary Axemen-Mavericks on May 3 and a 10-4 loss to the Medicine Hat Sun Devils on May 4.
