Wilton recently won the 2023 FCIAC Boys Lacrosse Tournament championship to vault up four spots to No. 1 and lead a group of six conference teams ranked among the top eight in the latest GameTimeCT Top 10 Boys Lacrosse Poll going into state tournament play.
Wilton, an 8-4 winner over New Canaan in the FCIAC tourney final and with a 15-4 record, received nine of the 13 first-place votes and 126 polling points to supplant Fairfield Prep for the No. 1 ranking.
Fairfield Prep (15-3), which lost an 8-7 overtime thriller to Cheshire in the Southern Connecticut Conference tournament final, got three first-place votes and 108 points to drop down to No. 2.
FCIAC teams New Canaan (13-6) and Darien (13-5) are ranked third and fourth, respectively, as New Canaan had 96 points and Darien was just three points behind with 93.
Cheshire (11-4) utilized its SCC title to vault up two spots to No. 5. Cheshire got the other first-place vote and 92 polling points, just one point less than No. 4 Darien.
Staples (13-5), Ridgefield (11-6), and St. Joseph (13-4) are ranked 6-8, respectively, as the other three teams among those six total FCIAC teams ranked among the top eight.
Weston (16-3) is No. 9 and Simsbury (13-3) completes the Top 10.
Greenwich (6-11), which was ranked No. 8 in the previous poll, received the 12th most points in the current poll as the only FCIAC team among the three total in the “Others receiving votes” category.
Wilton, New Canaan, Darien, Staples, and Ridgefield all earned high seeds as five of the 10 FCIAC teams in the 24-team field in the 2023 CIAC Class L Boys Lacrosse Tournament which began May 26 with the qualifying round.
Stamford, Brien McMahon, and Fairfield Ludlowe all won in the qualifying round to advance to the May 31 first round.
Defending state Class L champion Staples is seeded second while fellow FCIAC members Darien, New Canaan, Wilton, and Ridgefield are seeded 3-6, respectively. Seedings were determined by the teams’ records in the regular season.
St. Joseph is the top seed as the only FCIAC team in the Class S state tournament, and there are no conference teams in the Class M tourney.
Dave Sylvester and Caleb Rath each scored a pair of goals, Charles Rath had one goal and two assists, and goalie Evan Blankenship had a dozen saves to lead Wilton’s fourth-seeded Warriors to their 8-4 victory over third-seeded New Canaan in this year’s FCIAC final. It was Wilton’s first conference championship since 1999.
Wilton nipped top-seeded and defending conference champion Darien, 11-10, and New Canaan advanced with a 9-5 victory over second-seeded Staples in the FCIAC semifinals.
Darien’s championship in 2022 extended its record to 19 FCIAC championships.
Wilton, which won the first five FCIAC titles and eight of the first 10 from 1977-86, is second with 14 conference crowns. New Canaan is third with 10 FCIAC titles.
The trio of Darien, Wilton and New Canaan has combined to win 43 of the 46 conference championships contested since 1977. Other than that, Greenwich has won twice (2007 and 2010), and Ridgefield was the 2009 champion.
The winners of the first-round games of the Class L state tournament on May 31 were scheduled to advance to the June 3 (Saturday) quarterfinals at the sites of the higher-seeded teams.
The semifinals are scheduled for Wednesday, June 7, with the neutral sites and faceoff times to be announced.
The championship game on Saturday, June 10, will be played at Sacred Heart University at a time to be announced.