St. Cloud South has built a solid season on a shaky foundation.

Which is to say the Tigers did a nice job capitalizing on a weak regular season schedule.

As a member of the Minnesota Boys Scholastic Lacrosse Association’s Varsity North Conference, St. Cloud South is grouped with developing programs such as Brainerd, Grand Rapids and St. Cloud North. Hardly a Murderer’s Row of opponents.

Still, the Tigers have an eye-catching 15-2 record as they enter the semifinals of the MBSLA state tournament. That record, coupled with their lack of strength in their schedule, makes them the X-factor (read: long shot) in a field of otherwise established programs.

The Tigers play defending state champion Orono (12-2) at 7:30 p.m. on Thursday, June 17, in the second of two semifinals games at Orono High School. 2008 state champion St. Louis Park (15-3) and perennial power St. Paul (12-0) meet in the first semifinal at 5:30 p.m.

“That’s fine,” St. Cloud South coach Tyler Hein said about the Tigers’ underdog status. “Then the pressure is off us. We can just come in everybody is expecting everybody else to win, not expecting us to do too much.”

The Tigers’ upset hopes might have taken a bit of hit when their semifinal game against the Spartans, originally scheduled to be played in Buffalo, on Tuesday was moved to Orono’s home field.

“I guess the field was just too wet or muddy or something like that,” Hein said about Buffalo’s grass field.

While he would have preferred to have played Orono at a neutral site, Hein isn’t too worried about the shift in venues.

“It’s not like they bring in thousands of fans,” Hein said. “Hopefully we can bring in enough fans where it kind of evens out the crowd. It’s really no big deal to me.

“I told the kids, ‘Don’t worry about it.’ ”

Having dominated their opponents for much of the season, the Tigers were given a jolting introduction to blast-furnace playoff intensity in their state quarterfinal triumph over Hastings.

St. Cloud South took an early five-goal lead, only to see it all disappear in an eventual 10-9 overtime triumph. Anthony Milbauer scored the winner in overtime for the Tigers.

“I told some of my parents that I didn’t stop shaking until I was halfway home from that game, I was so excited,” Hein said.

The Tigers played Hastings without the services of honorable mention all-state long-stick midfielder Merek Regan, who was playing for an all-star traveling team over the weekend. Regan is expected to be back in the lineup for Thursday’s game.

Orono was without one of its top players, senior midfielder Dan Stephenson, in the Spartans’ 10-2 state quarterfinal triumph over White Bear Lake. Stephenson was sitting out the second game of a two-game suspension he received in Orono’s regular season finale against Duluth.

With Stephenson, Orono’s second-leading scorer out of the lineup, Spartans’ attackman stepped up his already considerable game. He has scored 10 goals in two playoff games, including five in Orono’s 7-0 Varsity West Conference playoff win over Delano.

“He scored five our seven goals, so it’s not hard to do the math on that one,” Orono coach Josh Scott said.

Maki, an all-state attackman, has scored at least three goals in all but one of the Spartan’s 13 games. He’s part of a veteran group that experienced the thrill of winning a state title last season.

“I look it as we’ve been there before,” Scott said about the expectations that go with being the defending champion. “All five of our captains have been there before. They know it is not going to be a blowout if we get to that championship game.”

Regular Season