AUBURN – The Falmouth boys’ lacrosse team always knows there are likely good things to come in their future.

So when St. Dom’s rallied to take a lead late in the closing seconds of the first half Saturday, the Yachtsmen weren’t too concerned.

Falmouth battled through a sluggish first half but knew the second half is always to its advantage. With their depth and strength on offense, the Yachtsmen knew it might only be a matter of time before they’d have the upper hand on a warm Saturday.

“We run three solid midfield lines the whole game,” said Falmouth coach Mike Lebel. “They have some great players on their team but not enough of them. They don’t have a lot of depth. Our philosophy is to run three midfield lines. You’re not to going to see us pull away from teams until the third and fourth quarters. That’s the way our team is built.”

Falmouth followed that plan perfectly to hand the Saints their first loss of the year with a 20-6 win. The Yachtsmen shrugged off the Saints’ halftime lead and scored 11 goals in the third quarter and four more in the fourth while shutting out St. Dom’s.

“It’s a snowball effect,” said St. Dom’s coach Jim Dock. “One thing happened and then another and then another. The next thing you know there’s some extra points on the board.”

Nick Bachman led Falmouth (2-2) with four goals and six assists. Dan Hanley had four goals and an assist while Mitch Tapley scored three and set up one. Mike Kane and Erik Tierney each added a pair of goals. The Saints (3-1) got four goals from Trevor Haefele and tallies from Ben Adams and Ryan Lussier.

“Coming off the victory Tuesday over Noble, we were flying high,” said Dock. “We got into the first half there, but then self-discipline started coming apart and unraveled.”

The momentum the Saints built with the late halftime lead was quickly replaced by a loss of composure in the second half as the Yachtsmen dominated the third quarter. The Saints were rushing shots and making bad passes, fueling an impressive transition game that allowed Falmouth to put the game away.

“Most of our practice is transition,” said Lebel, whose team had to shrug off the sting of a tough 6-3 loss to Cape. “There’s not a lot of six-on-six. So when we get on that transition, that fast break offense, we practice that and the kids are going to bury those chances.”

Falmouth also made some fine adjustments on its shots, getting used to the field and the bounce of the ball. Bachman had two goals and five assists in the third while Hanley scored three goals and had an assist.

“When a bunch of guys start going negative, it’s going to make a difference and it did,” said Dock. “It caught up with us, but we learned a lot from it. We knew this was going to be a tough game. Falmouth is one of those teams on the edge of cracking into the top. We’ve got to keep our heads up the entire time.”

Falmouth jumped out a 3-0 lead on goals by Bachman, Kane and Brendan McDowell, but the Saints got tallies from Haefele and Adams to get within 3-2. In the second quarter, Haefele tied the game, but the Yachtsmen answered with goals by Zach Alexander and Bachman for a 5-3 lead. After Haefele scored with 6:01 left, the Saints struck twice in the final minutes. Lussier scored with 1:51, and Haefele scored again with 11 seconds left to put the Saints in the lead.

“We were flying high off that, but it’s a balancing of the highs and the lows,” said Dock. “That’s one of the things we’ve tried to work on and keep things from going on the negative side and watch our heads when we’re going positive because we have a tendency to get inflated on it.”