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Pleasant Grove's Colton Braby (24) tries to gain control of the ball against Salem Hills in the second round of the 5A boys lacrosse playoffs on Tuesday, May 12, 2026.

Darnell Dickson, Daily Herald

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Pleasant Grove's Korban Warner (13) and Luke Henry of Salem Hills battle in a face off in the 5A boys lacrosse playoffs on Tuesday, May 12, 2026.

Darnell Dickson, Daily Herald

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Salem Hills' Eli Moses (left) Thomas James (center) and goalie Braden Larsen defend the goal against Pleasant Grove in the second round of the 5A boys lacrosse playoffs on Tuesday, May 12, 2026.

Darnell Dickson, Daily Herald

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Pleasant Grove's Travis McFadden (2) runs past a Salem Hills defender in the second round of the 5A boys lacrosse playoffs on Tuesday, May 12, 2026.

Darnell Dickson, Daily Herald

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Pleasant Grove's Grant Hepworth follows the path of his shot against Salem Hills in the second round of the 5A boys lacrosse playoffs on Tuesday, May 12, 2026.

Darnell Dickson, Daily Herald

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Pleasant Grove's Asher Bayles (17) celebrates with teammates after a 10-4 in against Salem Hills in the second round of the 5A boys lacrosse playoffs on Tuesday, May 12, 2026.

Darnell Dickson, Daily Herald

❮ ❯

When the Pleasant Grove boys lacrosse team plays its game, its pretty hard to beat.

The Vikings — the No. 10 seed in the 5A Tournament — played enough in their style on Tuesday to beat No. 23 Salem Hills 10-4 in the second round of the playoffs, but head coach Erik Bayles said his team will need a more consistent effort to succeed in Thursday’s quarterfinal round at No. 7 Judge Memorial.

“Salem Hills, you don’t know if they’re going to come in with their heads down or their heads up,” Bayles said. “They came in and played hard. They held us to less than we scored last time against them, and so we’ve got to be cleaner. We’ve got to play better than tonight. But our defense played well. I thought our offense did enough to put points on the board, but we’re better than we played tonight, and we’ve got to show that Thursday if we want to advance.”

Senior Liam Scott got the Vikings off to a good start, scoring consecutive goals midway through the first quarter. Sophomore Quinn Lawrence and  junior Henry Chipman each scored a goal and senior Carston Carter scored after a run from behind the net for a 5-0 PG lead with 7:06 to play in the second quarter.

“I think it’s our energy in the locker room and just our trust with each other,” senior captain Deegan Ash said. “We love each other as teammates, we’re brothers, and we’re just happy to play together.”

Salem Hills got one back toward the end of the quarter, taking advantage of a delay-of-game penalty on the Vikings. Tyler Darrington scored for the Skyhawks to make the score 5-1 heading into the second half.

Lawrence, Grant Hepworth and Myles Doman all scored in the third quarter and Pleasant Grove took an 8-1 lead. Salem Hills (2-15) outscored the home team 3-2 the rest of the way but the Vikings still managed a comfortable margin to the end.

“Playing our game means we’ve got to run our offense and move the ball,” Bayles said. “We don’t just want to look for a shot. We want to look for the better shot and the best shot. At times tonight, we were looking for a shot. Run the offense, look for the next pass, look for the better look.

“I’m not criticizing the offense. The offense did enough and they played well. I just think we have to take care of the little things if we’re going to advance. We’ve got to get better at both sides.”

Scott finished with two goals and an assist for Pleasant Grove (14-5), Lawrence scored two goals and Chipman had a goal and an assist.

“I think it went well,” Ash said. “We wanted a big win here. We wanted to play Judge on Thursday, so we came out with high energy and came out with a good start. If we give our full intensity and play our best game, we can take them.”

Judge Memorial (10-7) has played a very difficult schedule, with three losses coming to out-of-state competition. The Bulldogs also have close losses to the top two teams in 5A (No. 1 Park City, No. 2 Brighton) and 6A No. 1 Corner Canyon.

“We’ve got two phenomenal attack men (Lawrence and Doman), we’ve got a good MIDI line and we’re really deep, so we’re excited,” Bayles said. “We think we have a good team. We think we can make some noise, and we think our offense can put points on the board. We’re just going to have to clean up some little things. We’ve got Judge and Brighton on our side of the bracket so we can never be complacent. We have to get better every single day if we’re gonna play with with those guys.”