Staff photo / Brian Yauger Canfield junior Tommy Lorelli, left, makes a pass upfield during the Cardinals’ season-opening victory in Canfield over St. Vincent-St. Mary.

CANFIELD — Canfield got its season off on the right foot Friday, taking down Akron St. Vincent-St. Mary, 6-2 at Canfield High School.

“It’s a good message to these kids to see the hard work they put in leading up to this to be rewarded with the win,” Cardinals coach Dylan Ciolino said.

Canfield got on the board first, with senior Max Billak connecting with the back of the net. Billak finished with a hat trick.

The Cardinals controlled pace early on in the game, but as the opening quarter went on, SVSM started finding its rhythm.

The Irish scored twice in the second quarter to take a 2-1 lead, but that would be the last time they found the back of the net.

Canfield took over in the second half, controlling the pace once again, but were relentless in keeping the Irish from gaining any momentum.

“The captains (talked to the team in the locker room at halftime),” Ciolino said. “They let them know that, ‘Guys we know what we’re doing out there. We know the system we have in place, let’s just run it,’ and once we started doing that, they executed. It was a great performance.”

It was a busy offseason for Canfield in preparation for the year. The Cardinals have the benefit of having multiple full-time lacrosse players.

That means when the high school season comes around, the team is ready.

“I’m lucky a lot of my players play travel lacrosse over the summer, through various organizations, both local and up in Cleveland,” Ciolino said. “We do a lot of offseason open fields, weight room and I’m getting a good, a good amount of upperclassmen there to help the underclassmen in the weight room.”

Canfield is angling to make a postseason run, but with a challenging schedule ahead full of Cleveland and Canton-area schools, it’s not going to be easy.

“The expectation is to get us to go out in the field and control what we can control,” Ciolino said. “We have a tough schedule ahead of us. A lot of teams from Canton and Cleveland areas, so we’re going to go out there, take it one game at a time. I’d be happy for us to host a playoff game. Get another home playoff victory and see what we can do.”

On Tuesday, the Cardinals (1-0) play host to Akron Hoban and welcome Ravenna Southeast on Thursday.

There’s a familiarity with Hoban, as Canfield has been on the wrong side of the scoreboard when facing Hoban in years past. Ciolino likes the way his roster is shaping up this season, however.

“That’s going to be a tough game,” he said. “Hoban’s a very good program. A very well-coached team. We’re excited to get one back. We played them last year and they beat up on us pretty good, but I think we got a good game plan in place and we’ll see how it goes.

The tilt against Hoban is set for a 7:30 p.m. start.