Salesianum is the top seed in the 2025 DIAA boys lacrosse state tournament, which kicks off Tuesday with eight first-round games. Saint Mark’s and Archmere also made the field.
Salesianum is seeking its fifth straight state championship. They will open the defense of their title on May 20 against No. 16 Caravel at 7 p.m. at Abessinio Stadium.
The Sals and Cape Henlopen, who is the second seed, have met in the championship game every year since 2019. (The 2020 season was canceled because of the covid pandemic.) The Sals graduated 14 seniors from last year’s nationally ranked club, but their youth movement has been just as successful. Salesianum went 12-2, with their only losses coming to national powers Chaminade (N.Y.) and Malvern Prep (Pa.).
Their leading scorers are Luca Pompeii and Mitch Cummings, and they have a stellar faceoff specialist in Brayden Lasensky. Cam Taylor holds down the nets.
Should the Sals defeat Caravel, they would host the winner of No. 12 Brandywine-No. 5 Caesar Rodney.
Saint Mark’s is the seventh seed, and Archmere took the 10th. That means they will meet each other in the first round on May 20 at Saint Mark’s at 6 p.m. The winner meets the winner of No. 15 Sanford-No. 2 Cape Henlopen in the quarterfinals.
The Spartans finished the regular season 12-3, getting wins over tournament teams Brandywine, Sussex Academy and Wilmington Charter. All three of their losses came to teams seeded above them in the tournament: Appoquinimink, St. Andrew’s and Tatnall.
Saint Mark’s gets offense from a variety of players, including Alex Salerni, Chase Wisniewski and Nate Hughes. James Echevarria has been solid in net. This is the Spartans’ third straight trip to the state tournament. Last season, the reached the quarterfinals, falling to Cape Henlopen.
Their foe in the opening round, Archmere, is no stranger to postseason play. The Auks have been in the state tournament each season since at least 2009, with numerous trips to the semifinals.
This season, they went 10-5 against a challenging schedule that included Salesianum and Cape Henlopen. Their other in-state losses came to the third seed, Tatnall, and fifth seed, Caesar Rodney. The Auks defeated tournament teams Appo, Wilmington Charter, Sanford and Wilmington Friends.
The Auks’ top scorers include Quin Duncan, Ethan Beach and Aiden Mahoney, with Wyatt Beekley in the faceoff circle. Zidane Brena has been a wall in goal.
The quarterfinals will be held May 24 at the higher seed, with times to be determined. The semifinals are May 28 at Delaware Military Academy, and the championship is scheduled for May 31 at 3 p.m. at Caesar Rodney High School.
Tickets for all postseason events are available at www.gofan.co/app/school/DIAA.
