With a solid record of 6-5 through 11 games, Greenwich High School’s boys lacrosse team has involved in close games in most of its losses.

Unfortunately for the Cardinals, that wasn’t the case when Staples visited Cardinal Stadium this past Saturday.

The Cardinals faced just a two-goal deficit late in the second quarter and ended the first half down by three goals, yet the Wreckers methodically built their lead in the third quarter and rolled to a double-digit victory.

Holding Greenwich to one second-half goal, Staples posted an impressive 13-3 win in an FCIAC matchup. The victory was the fourth straight for the Wreckers, who are 7-3 on the season. Staples has captured the CIAC Class L state tournament title the past two seasons.

“We came in with a good game plan, ready to play,” Greenwich coach Bobby Lutz said. “We just struggled with getting possessions. They did really well on the draws. They controlled the tempo, picked up more ground balls. When you play a really good team, you have to get the ball in order to score.”

Adam Udell recorded a hat trick, while Charlie Clark and Tristan Schaefer scored two goals apiece to pace surging Staples.

Greenwich received one goal apiece from junior midfielder Colin Zeller, junior attack Mikey Brescia and junior attackman Conrad Burki.

Burki’s goal brought the Cardinals to within 4-2 with 2:24 remaining in the fourth quarter, but it was all Wreckers from there. The visitors tallied just before the end of the second quarter, then rode the momentum the whole second half.

“The first half we got some good looks,” Lutz said of the team’s offensive performance. “Once the game gets out of hand against a good team, the momentum slips away.”

Forced to play a lot of defense against the Wreckers, worked hard to prevent their FCIAC rival to pull away, yet possession time was key for the victors.

Greenwich was coming off victories against Fairfield Ludlowe and Staples and a tough, one-goal loss to Bronxville High School.

“We have a serious stretch right now,” Lutz said. “We played a lot of tough teams, when you look at the schedule, seven or eight games in a two-week span, so the boys are banged up a little bit. Fortunately, no one has an injury, but they’re all kind of nagging aches and pains, so we’ll have a little time to rest and prep for Ridgefield and we’ll bounce back.”

The matchup against conference rival Ridgefield Lutz referred to takes place Thursday at Cardinal Stadium with a 7 p.m. starting time.

“We have a bye on Tuesday so our next game is Thursday against Ridgefield, another quality opponent,” said Lutz, whose squad has lost two one-goal games and one two-goal games. “At least for that game, we have a lot of time to prepare.”

For Staples, Charlie Iannone, Justin Halky, Nick Weil, Hunter Pallali and Timmy Herold each had one goal apiece against the Cardinals.

The Wreckers are in action again on Thursday against visiting New Canaan in another FCIAC rivalry game. Josh Marcus registered five saves in goal in the winning effort.

Jack Hamel and Ilan Amaro combined to make five saves for Greenwich, which intends to get back on track against a strong Ridgefield squad.

In Greenwich’s recent 14-2 win over Weston on the road, Burki notched a game-high five goals, Brescia had two goals and three assists and had a hat trick with one assist.

Boden Farmer added one goal and one assist, while Lane Critchell posted one goal, as did Jimmy Flinn and Andrue Borrelli. Teddy Johnson and Jake Duda each had one assist for the Cards, who received eight saves from Hamel and four from Amaro.

Critchell won 10 of the 11 faceoffs he took against Weston. The Cards entered halftime against Weston with a 13-0 advantage.

“Weston, it was a good game,” Lutz noted. “For the first six, seven minutes of the game, we played the best lacrosse that we played in a long time.”