Souhegan girls lacrosse holds off Pinkerton in D1 quarterfinal

AMHERST - Everyone on the sidelines Thursday knew they were in for a close game.

After splitting their two matchups in the regular season, there wasn’t a person involved with the Souhegan High School or Pinkerton Academy girls lacrosse teams that was going to take their Division I quarterfinal matchup lightly.

They were all right.

Round 3 was another tight game between the No. 4 Sabers and No. 5 Astros that came down to the final minutes. After falling behind by two early in the third quarter, Souhegan took control in the final 19 minutes to win 10-8 and keep its season alive.

“We played with heart (Thursday),” said Souhegan coach McKinley Curro-Sbordone. “It was a great fight from both teams. I’m so proud of how our girls continued to fight despite being down a couple times.”

As a result, the Sabers will now head to Exeter's Bill Ball Stadium on Saturday to face top seed Portsmouth at 6 p.m. in the semifinals. Bishop Guertin faces Bedford in the other semifinal at 4 p.m.

But in Thursday's quarterfinal, Curro-Sbordone credited her seniors with keeping the team in the game.

“We have great senior leadership," the coach said. "They really carried the team. They never doubted we could fight back. This team feels like the underdogs even though we are not.”

Libby Kennedy led the charge for the Sabers in the second half. The freshman midfielder won several draws that directly led to multiple Souhegan goals, two of which she scored and a third by Natalie Heimarck, which she assisted on.

Kennedy finished with a game-high four goals and tied Pinkerton’s Haily Schnider for the most points with five. She also won five draws in the game.

The Astros came out strong to begin the game. Schnider scored Pinkerton’s first three goals to give the team a 3-1 lead after the first quarter, but she would not score for the rest of the game.

The Sabers quickly made the adjustment to have freshman Sophie Jacobs face guard Schnider for the rest of the game, neutralizing Pinkerton’s hot hand.

“It was amazing to see her step up in that role and take their best player out of the game,” said Curro-Sbordone.

The defensive changes helped turn the momentum for Souhegan (14-4) as the Sabers scored three goals in the second quarter to take a 4-3 lead into halftime.

The second half started the same way as the game with three Pinkerton goals from the trio of Natalie Paradzick, Delaney Summers and Francesca Doyle, with Schnider assisting on two of the goals.

Undeterred, the Sabers once again mounted a comeback. The team would outscore Pinkerton 5-1 for the rest of the quarter to take a 9-7 lead into the final frame. Lyla Kimball’s second goal gave the Sabers the lead at 8-7 while Isabelle Stevenson’s second goal of the game gave the Sabers a two-goal lead which proved to be the difference in the game.

The Astros scored a goal in the last quarter but missed the net on several occasions. After Kennedy scored with just over four minutes left, the Sabers extended their possessions and slowed the game down to run out the clock.

“We wanted to get a two-goal cushion before we tried to stall," said Curro-Sbordone. "It’s never easy to stall a team that is fighting for their lives. Our girls were poised and were smart with the ball, which is huge because possessions is everything in lacrosse.”

And now it's another rubber match with Portsmouth (15-2), as two teams split their regular-season series with the road team winning each game, 15-14 Souhegan, and 12-3 Portsmouth, the latter just last week in the regular-season finale.

The Clippers beat No. 8 Londonderry 11-4 in their quarterfinal Thursday.

This story and photo were provided by the Nashua Telegraph.