FLEMING ISLAND — With a four-goal effort from Meredith Giebeig and a five-goal effort from Caden Lopez, the Fleming Island High girls and boys lacrosse teams landed in their respective district finals with a doubleheader winning Friday night at Fleming Island High.

"We have been playing a lot better in the final couple of weeks to earn the district final spot," said Fleming Island girls coach Isabella Marx, now 11-6 for the season after their 12-7 District 3-1A semifinal win over St. Augustine on Friday. "We are a totally different team now then we were when we played Bolles earlier in the season. We played sloppy and they got like eight or nine shots from the eight (free position shooter vs. goalie penalty shots)."

Marx' reference to Bolles comes as Bolles was the district championship game played Wednesday, April 15. Bolles beat Fleming Island 22-7 on March 30 and defeated Menendez in their semifinal 21-0 to advance.

"We have shared the goal scoring duties up front with Meredith our top scorer, but Kelsey (Hodge), Kathryn (Ward) and Brylee (Thomas) are all starting to put the ball in the net. Our offense is very balanced around Meredith."

Giebeig, who reached 100 career goals earlier in the season, leads the way with 64 goals for the season.

Against St. Augustine, Giebeig scored her first goal of her four goals in less than 10 seconds to put the gas pedal down for the Eagles. That score stayed through the first quarter with Thomas adding one to 2-0 and St. Augustine scoring to 2-1 before Ward scored on a free position score to 3-1. Thomas got the fourth goal of the half with 3:51 to halftime.

"We've learned to be aggressive in front of the goalie and that tends to attract contact," Marx said. "A defender that steps in front of a shooting player will get the penalty (shooting space call). That's why we want them to shoot more when in front of the goal."

In the second half, St. Augustine struck first to 4-2 with Giebeig answering to 5-2 just 19 seconds later.

St. Augustine kept pressuring in front of Fleming Island goalie DJ Feder with St. Augustine scoring three goals in the third around four goals from Fleming Island to end the third at 10-6. Scorers were Giebeig on an assist from Ward (6-3), Thomas off an assist from Ward (7-3), Ward on a free position score (8-4), Hodge on a breakaway (9-4) and Giebeig with a nifty underhand shot to 10-5.

St. Augustine tried to make the fourth quarter interesting with a quick goal to 10-6, but Hodge landed two to 12-6 with St. Augustine scoring last to 12-7.
Bolles is ranked 26th in Florida girls lacrosse at 8-7 with a 13.18 strength of schedule while Fleming Island is 75th at 10-6, but with a -1.39 strength of schedule. Bolles lost in round one of the region playoffs the last three years.
In the boys' game, junior Caden is the attacker for coach Jimmy Oliver with 33 goals on the season.

"We were without some key players throughout the season with injuries and it has been a team effort to kind of fill the gaps," Oliver said. "Caden has been the leader with Will Larkin and Jack Geiger playing stronger."

Against Sandalwood in their district 2-2A semifinal, Lopez got five goals with Larkin adding two more in the 12-4 Fleming Island win. Fleming Island got to their district final on Tuesday, April 14 against Fletcher at Fletcher (9-6). Fletcher defeated Mandarin 15-7 in that semifinal.

In the boys' game, Sandalwood, 11-3 for the season, scored first near the seven-minute mark before Fleming Island answered with 10 goals to halftime— led by Lopez scoring his five goals for the game before the break.

Fleming Island's first goal was off an assist by Cullen Lopez to Spencer Hughes at 4:13 in the first before Caden three more in the first quarter with Larkin and Geiger both adding goals to 7-1 for the first quarter.

In the second quarter, Will Benoit scored one with Larkin finding Lopez for the final goal on the half at 10-1.

Fletcher beat Fleming Island 10-5 on April 2 with Lopez held to just one goal. Fletcher has had seasons of 14-7 and 13-5 the past two seasons with a region semifinal loss to 2A runner-up Ponte Vedra last year and a 7-6 region round one loss to Nease in 2024.