The Montclair Girls Varsity Lacrosse team took a 16-12 victory against the Madison Dodgers this past Thursday. Coming into this game, Montclair was 0-1 on the season, ready to get their first win in their home opener. Some key players in the game Thursday afternoon were junior attacker Olivia Nicoll, who tallied 9 points, and sophomore goalie Sefina Morrison with 19 saves.
Montclair started off the game strong, gaining an early lead 3-1 just 6 minutes into the game. A draw control by Madison leads to a fast break and a quick goal, making the score 3-2. Montclair comes back from this, gaining two more goals and bringing the score to 5-2. Madison got some strong scoring opportunities but the Mounties defense held strong, with goalie Sefina Morrison making some amazing saves. An interception by Olivia Nicoll after Madison won the draw led to a fast break. Nicoll fed the ball to junior attacker Aven Hodgson who scored, giving Montclair a 6-2 lead. Madison won the draw and transitioned down the field to settle the ball. The Dodgers passed around and capitalized on a strong scoring opportunity off a dodge, making the score 6-3. But, the Mounties pushed right back at the end of the quarter with Olivia Nicoll drawing a penalty in the 8 meter, which she converted, bringing the score to 7-3.
The second quarter scoring started slow, with scoring opportunities for both teams, but no goals. #17 from Madison drew multiple penalties and scored one of them, bringing the score to 7-4. The Mounties responded quickly with Hodgson finding a hole in the Madison defense leading to another goal for Montclair. However, Madison struck right back with #33 getting a quick feed that led to a goal for the Dodgers. Montclair’s defense held strong for almost the rest of the quarter, but with 4 seconds left Madison scored off a fast break. The first half came to an end with a score of 8-6, Montclair in the lead.
The Mounties kicked off the second half strong, with a solid showing of their defense, as Hodgson made an interception and then fed the ball to Nicoll, bringing the score to 9-6 Montclair. Morrison made multiple great saves, leading to a pickup by senior Hannah Saraisky who pushed the ball down the field on a fast break and then passed to senior Lizzy Giordano, who scored. Then, the Mounties got two more goals from sophomore Thea McGarry and Olivia Nicoll, bringing the score to 12-6. Montclair won the draw and slowed down their play, subtly trying to run the clock with a couple of minutes left in the third quarter. Around this time, Nicoll drew a penalty for shooting space and scored, making the score 13-6. Nicoll then won the ball off the draw and pushed it down the field, feeding to McGarry who scored with only 9 seconds left in the quarter. To finish out the quarter, Morrison made another amazing save to keep the score at 14-6 going into the last quarter.
Madison came out fast, winning the first draw and drawing a penalty, giving them a strong opportunity to score and capitalize on it. But, the Mounties quickly gained control of the ball off the draw and Nicoll dodged five different Madison defenders to push the score to 15-7. The Dodgers then got a quick goal, followed by Giordano getting another for Montclair. Madison won the ball and pushed it down the field, but the Montclair defense held strong, with multiple penalty shots being saved by Morrison. But, while man down, Montclair got another penalty shot, which Madison used to bring the score to 16-9. To close out the game, Madison managed to gain possession multiple times and get a number of scoring opportunities. The Dodgers used this to their advantage, finding some holes in the defense, and drawing more penalties, bringing the score to 16-12, with a Montclair win to end the game. With this win, Montclair moves to 1-1 on the season, and they’ll look to build on this win with another one at home vs Immaculate Heart this Wednesday.