The storied Bridgewater-Raritan High School boys’ lacrosse Class of 2025 was celebrated after another big triumph on Wednesday evening.
A large, 19-member group consisting of Jace Burns, Carter Grant, Ethan Danneberger, Brendan Bicking, Andrew Childs, Brady Millets, Owen Muti, Matt Lelli, Will Skayhan, Nick Wisniewski, Nick DiEsso, Cole Kostes, Matt Kronengold, Ben Morehead, Brody Nussman, Nick Ventrice, Cam Rice, Ray Khan, and Chris Spinello quickly experienced the mountaintop of Group 4 lacrosse as freshmen, when they launched their campaigns with Bridgewater Raritan's most recent state championship in 2022.
While the Panthers came up short of this milestone in their sophomore and junior seasons, they hope that their seniors’ third bid at repeating as state champions will be the charm.
During what ended up being a postgame Senior Night ceremony, the Panthers’ graduating seniors shared their top memories going back to their historic season in 2022, which ended with a semifinal berth in the NJSIAA’s final Tournament of Champions.
Arguably, their consensusfavorite was Bridgewater-Raritan'ss regular-season victory over rival Pingry School on Community Day during their sophomore season, when they famously rallied from a three-goal deficit in the fourth quarter and won in double overtime under their home Turf 2 lights.
Rice was quick to publicly mention the Panthers’ NJSIAA North Jersey, Group 4, sectional final victory as a freshman at Hunterdon Central Regional High School, particularly given Bridgewater-Raritan avenged an earlier overtime Community Day defeat against this same Red Devils squad while ending their perfect season on the road. That Bridgewater-Raritan squad then hurled their sticks in the air again at the game’s final buzzer, four days later, when it defeated Southern Regional High School to win the most recent of its seven state championships.
Of course, Rice also mentioned the aforementioned Community Day result the following season against Pingry during his sophomore year on May 6, 2023, as one of his favorite memories.
“That really gave me confidence to keep on pushing and listening to the older guys when I was younger,” explained of the thrill of this victory by Rice, now one of the orchestrators of another sound Bridgewater-Raritan defense in 2025.
But one that was especially lethal again on Senior Night, when No. 18-ranked Bridgewater- Raritan (7-3) built an early seven-goal lead over North Hunterdon Regional High School (5-7), and Millets connected on a game-high five goals in a contest where four of the Panthers’ eight different scorers were multi-goal scorers.
Kronengold (10 saves) shined as the Panthers’ starting goalie to help his team pitch a shutout over a stretch of nearly 24 minutes spanning the second through fourth quarters, and Bridgewater-Raritan rolled to a 15-3 victory on April 23, in Bridgewater.
“I faced some adversity earlier in the season, but I came out today, stepped up, and took advantage of my opportunity,” Kronengold shared. “I had an amazing defense in front of me, and we were communicating well.”
“The offense did really well, and it was a team effort.”