Longmeadow girls lacrosse too strong as Blue Devils suffer first loss of season
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NORTHAMPTON - The Northampton girls lacrosse team opened a lot of eyes with 10 consecutive wins to start the season.
In Friday's 15-7 loss to perennial power Longmeadow, the Blue Devils' eyes were opened - to what it will take to win in the tournament, but also to just how good they can be.
Northampton (10-1) fell behind 8-2 by halftime, but played Longmeadow toe-to-toe in the second half and got its potent offense on track.
"If we play them again, we have to re-emphasize what we did in the second half, and maintain the window of hope," said Hamp coach Sue Biggs. "If we pick up more ground balls, it's a much different game."
With the victory, the eight-time champion Lancers (10-2) secured a postseason berth. Northampton had already clinched.
Senior midfielder Emily King scored four times and added an assist to help Hamp back into contention. Johanna Fleming (assist), Molly King and Lauren Durfer had a goal apiece in the loss.
"I think in the second half, we played our strongest," said Emily King. "We wanted to come out and play our best because it's Longmeadow, and we wanted to stay with them as much as we could. We came off a good win against East Longmeadow, so that amped us up for today."
The Northampton defense did its best to keep it close early, but the Blue Devils couldn't sustain possession and the Lancers took control. They led 5-0 before Fleming raced up the right side and scored to put Hamp on the board.
"Our defensive effort was tremendous, we made them work for everything," said Biggs. "But Longmeadow's a very patient team. They move the ball so well and have such great stick skills that it's tough to play your girl and also the ball."
Sarah Hannigan (four goals) and Ciara Dudeck (three) both had hat tricks for Longmeadow.
"They did a great job of picking off of us, and we weren't seeing it real well," said King. "Once we improved on that and caught on to what they were doing, we shut them down a few times."
Biggs harped on the Longmeadow dominance of ground balls, which in turn gave them much of the possession.
"We knew we weren't doing very well with ground balls, but once we started doing a little better, we stepped it up on offense and had the ball in their zone a lot more," Emily King said.
With the score 8-1, Emily King scored consecutive goals to cut the lead to 8-3. She had four straight tallies for Northampton, which trailed 15-5 before Durfer and Molly King closed out the scoring in the final two minutes.
"When you play a team of their quality, you have to raise your game that much more," said Biggs. "That includes playing more aggressively and going to the ball. This is the first time we've filmed this season, so we'll get to look at where we can improve on ground balls."
Nicole Grevior (seven saves) played the first half in goal and made some sparkling saves for the Blue Devils. Kyla Power came on in the second half and made four stops.
Hamp has three home games next week, but will then face another power in Minnechaug on May 16 and 17.
"We need to continue to push ourselves," said Emily King. "We must work the ball better on the offensive end and tighten things up on the defensive end."
Biggs added, "We know that Longmeadow and Minnechaug are the two strongest teams, and now we can look forward to the Minnechaug games coming up. I think we needed this today - not a loss, but the practice against such a powerful team. Nobody in a Hamp jersey gave up, we played pretty well."
Michael Wilkinson can be reached at mwilkinson@gazettenet.com.
